Sri Lanka: A nation’s quest for dignity and future
By Antonella Palermo - Colombo, Sri Lanka
A primary goal in Sri Lanka is to strengthen the education system to build the integral well-being of individuals and foster new leadership that is attentive to the real needs of people evermore hungry for dignity, job opportunities, and self-awareness.
This is the mission of the MAGIS Foundation, part of the Euro-Mediterranean Province of the Society of Jesus, that coordinates and promotes missionary and international cooperation activities through the efforts of Jesuits and laypeople in 47 projects across 22 countries.
A wounded island
The first destination of our journey takes us to the island nation's commercial capital, Colombo, a city that lies on the west coast of the Indian Ocean, featuring multifaceted architecture shaped by its British colonial past, and home to the state's only airport. The logistic base for internal travel movements is Negombo, about forty kilometres away, where the Archdiocese of Colombo and the Jesuit Provincial Curia are located. They are in the same area as the church of St Sebastian where attacks on Easter Sunday five years ago caused the death of more than one hundred people. Participating in the journey is MAGIS president, Professor Ambrogio Bongiovanni, who has been involved in the Indian subcontinent for over thirty years.
Planning together
President Ambrogio Bongiovanni highlights the specificity of his organization’s approach: activities are planned collaboratively with a shared vision from the base, not imposed from above. The MAGIS president, who is also a professor at the Pontifical Gregorian University, emphasizes the effectiveness of the organization’s humanitarian aid initiatives, particularly in the global South, focusing on culture, fundamental rights, peace, and healthcare. Happily, the journey through Sri Lanka happened to coincide with the approval of a project by the Italian Agency for International Cooperation which pledged over a million euros to promote education, integral ecology, and reconciliation in the island nation.
Forming generations for new leadership
Jesuit Father Angelo Sujeewa Pathirana, the Superior Provincial of Sri Lanka Province is our guide. He sees this initiative as a new step of collaboration to assist the most disadvantaged persons and stresses the importance of cooperation, recalling past natural disasters including the 2004 tsunami that caused over 230 thousand deaths, of which 30,000 in Sri Lanka alone. He emphasizes the need to empower people suffering from overwhelming poverty at a time in which an 18% increase in VAT is bringing families to their knees as they struggle to face costs that have become 'unsustainable and unaffordable'. In the sector of education in which investments should be the greatest, stationery imports are falling, historic bookshops are laying off staff. The price of paper has risen by 300%, and transport, he adds, suffers from the same trend. "It is a matter of transmitting basic tools of knowledge, especially good English, which also offers a way to share Christian values," says Father Angelo. Also at stake, he continues, is the development of a "political vision, of an attitude that is attentive to the ills of society". It is a question of preparing the new generations to face problems with a new spirit: "We also try to refer to the YWL method, which aims in particular to offer high school girls experiences to empower them also as leaders, in the awareness of their rights," the Jesuit father points out.
The country is hungry
Expressing discontent with the lack of political change, the Jesuit priest looks to the upcoming presidential elections expressing hope for a new leadership focused on the country's interests rather than personal gains. He echoes the sentiments of Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, who, on Republic Day posed the question “What does it mean to celebrate freedom amidst economic turmoil and political stalemate?” The people are hungry, and the country declared bankruptcy in April 2022, accumulating debts exceeding 83 billion dollars. The current provisional government, following the resignation of President Rajapakse, secured a 2.9 billion dollar loan from the International Monetary Fund, showing signs of recovery despite a 95% inflation rate. But Sri Lanka currently has the lowest payment figure in the entire Asia-Pacific and Oceania region, and as of 2022, the country has experienced a massive exodus of skilled and unskilled workers as a result of the currency collapse.
The Shanti Center
Dehiwala, one of the poorest neighbourhoods in the capital, hosts the Shanti Community Animation Movement, a non-profit association founded in 1977 by Jesuit missionary Father Michael Catalano. We are welcomed by the director, Father Ranjiit Yawu SJ, and by his assistant Sujeewa who is a teacher and counsellor; she is a Buddhist who has been working here since 1999. "We look after 56 children. With the after-school programme, we involve about 400 others. They are very comfortable here, the environment is very friendly. The little ones are very happy," she says." The people here are very poor. They earn about 10-15 thousand rupees (not even 50 euros a month) and live in very small houses. There are very few men and sometimes even the mother figure is missing as women are forced to go abroad to look for job opportunities. “In that case," she explains, "there are only lone children, the eldest looking after the youngest”.
The centre focuses on capacity building, skills training, and education for children and adults, particularly women and victims of war and natural disasters. Sujeewa and Fr Ranjiit illustrate the many challenges faced by families, including cases of abuse that take place in cramped living spaces.
Towards the tea plantations
The conditions of poverty and unease in districts close to the capital are just a prelude to deeper issues that plague the rural areas where NGO assistance is scarce. The next episode brings insights into the reality of those who work and live on the tea plantations: Ceylon’s green wealth.
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