Kalinga Seneviratne
COLOMBO, Feb 7 2006 (IPS) – A Buddhist monk, who tabled a bill in the Sri Lankan parliament to control the sale of tobacco and alcohol, says he is gratified at the wide support he has received in a country known for the deep divisions among its ethnic and religious communities.
Omalphe Sobitha, parliamentarian representing the pro-Sinhalese Buddhist National Heritage Party (JHU), believes that his private member s bill might even help his party shed its extremist image .
We have been labelled extremist, but, now JHU is not extremist or Sinhala chauvinist, but acting on the behalf of all ethnic and religious groups. The Christians, Muslims and Hindus are all supporting our bill, he told IPS in an interview. We brought this (bill) to save our people, not to condemn anyone.
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse owes his victory leading the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) in the November elections to support from the JHU, in return for which he had pledged a tough stance against Tamil militant groups that have been waging a two-decade-old civil war to create a separate Tamil homeland in the north and east of the island.
Rajapakse s victory immediately put in jeopardy a truce forged between the Sri Lankan government and the main militant group Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Feb. 2002. However, the two sides have, through international pressure, agreed to sit down together for peace talks in Geneva, later this month.
Sobitha s bill, which was presented to parliament this month, was immediately challenged in court by organisations representing the powerful tobacco and alcohol industries, which provide over 15 percent of the government tax revenues, on the grounds that it violated freedom of expression and free choice and the right to engage in a fair trade.
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If passed, the legislation will provide for the setting up of a statutory body, that would regulate the sale of cigarettes and alcohol in the country. Its aim is to ban the sale of cigarettes and alcoholic products in supermarkets.
Our people are getting addicted to alcohol at an alarming rate, and recent surveys have shown that Sri Lanka has the highest per capita consumption rates for alcohol in the world, noted Sobitha. We cannot stop the sale of alcohol or tobacco, but we can surely control its sale.
Sri Lanka also happens to have one of the highest suicide rates in the world indicating a high degree of stress and frustration among its people that has been blamed on the long-running civil war.
Sobitha says that in a country where a majority of the people are Buddhists, it is a shame that the government and the people have not been heeding the advice given by the Buddha, more than 2500 years ago, on protection of personal wealth and well-being..
Among the three major reasons for not been able to protect your wealth is alcohol, gambling and loitering at night, opined Sobitha. Alcohol not only destroys your wealth, it also has an impact on the welfare of others, especially when domestic violence, abuse of women and children are on the increase.
Christian churches, which vehemently opposed another bill, tabled last year by Sobitha, seeking to stop unethical religious conversions, are now strongly backing his anti-substance abuse legislation.
The heads of five Christian denominations have filed a petition in court to appear and support the bill. They said the bill is a means of promoting social and national welfare and arresting social and cultural decline due to alcohol and tobacco abuse which the Christian churches have also declared as major social evils afflicting the nation.
About 74 percent of Sri Lanka s 20 million people are Sinhalese, most of them Buddhist while Tamils constitute 18 percent and are predominantly Hindu. Christians and Muslims form seven and eight percent of the population, respectively.
Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) which have labelled the JHU as extremist are also backing the bill. The Sri Lanka Federation of NGOs Against Drug Abuse has fully endorsed the proposals in the bill, and said that all citizens in the country must get behind it.
Sobitha has also received praise for the bill from the International Federation of NGOs for the Prevention of Drugs and Substance Abuse for an initiative which takes over from where others failed.
Over the past 30 years, attempts to bring in legislation in the Sri Lankan parliament to control the trade in tobacco and alcohol, have died natural deaths due to industry and underworld pressure.
A number of studies in recent years have pinpointed alcohol abuse as being at the root of many social ills. A consistent finding has been that Sri Lanka s adolescents need access to information about the dangers of alcohol and smoking.
Research commissioned by the Norwegian development agency FORUT in 2004 found that the effects of alcohol on the community were enormous. The poor were affected the most and often male bread winners spend the bulk of their incomes on alcohol, resulting in domestic violence and crime.
The Sri Lanka Medical Association (SLMA) has described the bill as a long overdue step and called for legislation to implement the provisions of World Health Organisation s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control that Sri Lanka ratified in November 2003.
Sri Lanka took the lead in drafting such legislation and presenting it to parliament few years ago. But this was not taken to the logical end. We are not aware of the influences that led to the proposed legislation being allowed to die a quiet death, the SLMA said in a statement indicating that powerful lobbies have acted against controls on tobacco and alcohol use.
But Sobitha is disappointed at the lack of support shown by parliamentary colleagues. The MPs have a duty to protect the people from the social ills created by smoking and alcohol consumption. They have the chance now to show that they care, he said.
The monk needs the support of his colleagues because the bill will need a two-thirds majority in parliament to pass or be put to a referendum, if the courts rule that it violates existing constitutional provisions.
Sobitha is confident the court will rule in his favour.
It is not easy to get a private member s bill passed in parliament. Not only do you need to get it passed through three readings, but many vested interests try to block the process, noted Sobitha, adding that criminal syndicates and the underworld had stakes in stalling the bill. If they get rid of the member, the bill dies with it.
But, he said, the JHU will tap into the wide community support attracted by the bill and will soon start a public awareness campaign around the country to pressure members of parliament into supporting it.
On this issue we can show how harnessing national harmony could overcome heavy odds and allow parliament to act on the behalf of people, a confident Sobitha said.
