Peace in Sri Lanka

HE President Mahinda Rajapakse has appointed Rajiva Wijesinha, Senior Professor of Languages at Sabaragamuwa University, as Secretary General of the Secretariat for Coordinating the Peace Process (SCOPP)

Dr. Wijesinha, whose appointment was effective June 1, 2007, believes the Secretariat represents the cutting edge of the Government's efforts to strengthen the peace process on behalf of all Sri Lankan citizens. More specifically, the mission of the Secretariat is to develop confidence in the process while being recognized as an institution that is equitable and acting in the national interest of all Sri Lankans.

Apart from his work in English Literature and Language Studies, Prof Wijesinha is an authority on Sri Lankan political history as well as political philosophy. He has traveled widely, including throughout Sri Lanka, in particular when he coordinated the pre-University General English Language Training (GELT) programme for the whole country, and English programmes at ten Affiliated University Colleges including those at Vavuniya, Trincomalee, Amparai, Buttala and Kamburupitiya. He has been a Consultant to the South Eastern University and the Trincomalee Campus of the Eastern University, and has served as a Visiting Lecturer at Jaffna and Peradeniya Universities.

He obtained his first degree in classics from University College, Oxford, and went on to do a doctorate in English at Corpus Christi College, where he held the E K Chambers Studentship. His first post was at Peradeniya University, and while at Sabaragamuwa University he was responsible for the reintroduction of English medium education in secondary schools through the Amity School programme as an Adviser to the Ministry of Education. He has also served on the National Education Commission, and was Chairman of the Academic Affairs Board of the National Institute of Education from 2004 to 2006.

He is a former leader of the Liberal Party, and continues as a Vice-President of Liberal International and a member of the LI Human Rights Group. He was interim chair of the Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats and has conducted workshops on Liberalism in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Afghanistan and Indonesia.

He has edited anthologies of Sri Lankan poetry and short stories in English, and most recently ‘Bridging Connections’, a collection of English, Sinhala and Tamil short stories that is published by the National Book Trust of India. His fiction includes ‘Acts of Faith’, about the ethnic violence of 1983, and ‘Servants’, (winner of the Gratiaen Prize in 1995), both of which have been translated into Italian. Cambridge University Press in India has recently published his ‘Foundations of Modern Society’ and ‘Political Principles and their Practice in Sri Lanka’, in addition to ‘A Handbook of English Grammar’. In July it will publish ‘Declining Sri Lanka’, an update of ‘ Sri Lanka in crisis: J R Jayewardene and the erosion of democracy, 1977-1988’. Books he has edited include ‘Conflict – Causes and Consequences’ and, most recently, ‘Ideas for Constitutional Reform’, an abridged version of the longer seminal collection on the subject edited by Dr Chanaka Amaratunga in 1991.