“There is now a need to evolve a 'Tamil consensus' just as the TNA is demanding – and justifiably so – a Sinhala consensus. Given the realities of the existing military situation, which cannot be wished away either, the when and how of it have become as important as the why and which of it, if not more.”
___________________
by N. Sathiyamoorthy
(July 15, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian) Reports quoting the Sri Lankan Government's Peace Secretariat that future talks with the LTTE would include all the Tamil political parties should not come as a surprise to anyone. Combined with TMVP leader Karuna's assertion that some top Government officials were attempting to split the party, the Peace Secretariat's announcement should set all Tamil groups re-thinking on their strategies from the past and tactics for the future. There is truth in the Tamils' claim – reiterated recently by TNA's R Sampanthan -- that a 'southern Sinhala consensus' was a pre-requisite for any meaningful negotiations leading to a political settlement.
It is becoming equally, if not even more important that for such a settlement to work on ground, there needs to be not only a consensus, but also a commonality of approach in the polity. If anything, they are already united in their goals it is on the approach road that they have taken different routes. Many sections of the Tamil polity and the community strongly see a continuing 'Sinhala conspiracy' to remain politically divided all the time, if only to ensure that the Tamils were not given their due, in terms of power-devolution. For all this however the Tamils need to concede that they too are at fault, and precisely on the same grounds. From the word, 'Go', the Tamil community had remained divided . Worse still, there are more political divisions within the linguistic minorities compared to the majority community. For the divisions within themselves, based on regions and sub-regions, caste and class, not to mention personality problems, the Tamils in general and sections of the Tamil polity and intelligentsia in particular would want to blame the Sinhala polity.
The argument would go that it was the majority Sinhala community that had split the Tamils . They would not want to believe, nor accept that the Tamils were ever ready to be split – and that was why they got split.
The less said about the plight of the Tamil-speaking Muslims, the better. It's particularly so after the LTTE began claiming to be the sole-arbiter of the Tamil-speaking people, and also enforced it ruthlessly. Worse still is the case of the Tamils killing Tamils in the name of claiming equality with the Sinhala majority.
It is another matter that the Tamil polity was divided long before the LTTE began silencing contradictory political opinion from within the community. The rival ranks have remained, at times dormant, but often multiplying to add new shades of Tamil societal and political opinion opposed not to the LTTE's views but to its ways.
The Tamils – and by this, the reference is to all Tamil-speaking population in Sri Lanka -- cannot expect from the Sinhalas, or any other, what they do not give themselves in the first place – unity, that is.
For close to a year now, the LTTE leadership has been constantly and repeatedly calling upon the world's Tamils, numbering 80 million, to come to the "aid of the party". But as the typographer would tell you, test-typing the other half – the first half of the popular phrase -- "now is the time for all good men" in the Tamil community, to come to their own aid, instead.
In all this, the role and contribution of the LTTE cannot be wished away. It needs to acknowledge its own contribution to the creation of a separate Tamil polity in the East, and also of a deeper urge for a separate 'Tamil-speaking Muslim political identity'.
It was the indifference of the vociferous and more powerful sections of the Sri Lankan Tamil community to the plight of the Malayaha Tamils at the turn of Independence that forced the likes of late Soumyamurthi Thondaman to maintain a separate political course for the former. It was the violent attacks by the LTTE, then under the leadership of 'Col' Karuna in the East, that was behind current apprehensions about the radicalisation of the Muslim youth.
Since then, Karuna, for instance, has had complaints against the LTTE leadership, and complaints against the Government. It is no different in the case of other sections of the polity of the Tamil-speaking community in the country. Even the four member constituents of the LTTE-sympathetic Tamil Nationalist Alliance (TNA) have found the need or justification to merge their political identity into one long after they came under one umbrella, as a single-issue entity in parliamentary democracy.
It had all started with the TULF precursor to the TNA, and it has not changed with the TNA, either – not to leave out the non-LTTE/anti-LTTE sections of the Tamil polity. It is their 'conviction' that the LTTE was the only answer to the moods, motives and methods of the Sri Lankan State that has differentiated the TNA from other sections of the Tamil polity.
In the numbers game that is at the bottom of electoral majorities the democratic world, nearly 45 members that the Tamil-speaking sections have in the 225-seat Sri Lankan Parliament is saying a lot. At this late at the very least, the LTTE needs to acknowledge that it had not been able to find the answers that it had sought for a unified leadership for an undivided Tamil community. The Tamils cannot preach to the Sinhalese one thing, and practice another themselves. In what is seen as a Tamil prescription for absorbing the Tamil-speaking Muslim community into their fold, for instance, equity and equality are phrases that have found a repeated mention in one form or the other – and in one way or the other.
There is no denying the denials meted out to the Tamils by the majority Sinhala community. With the international community seriously engaged in Sri Lanka's ethnic issue, unlike at the time of 'Sinhala only' and 'Standardisation', the Tamil polity cannot afford to harp on the past eternally. The Indo-Sri Lanka Accord was the first such effort aimed at addressing the Tamil concerns, but it was thwarted by the moderate TULT and militant LTTE, claiming to act for the Tamils but acting independently. Little did they realise that the greater complexity of the Indian domestic situation had still produced solutions acceptable to all communities and implemented through parliamentary legislation, executive orders, or court verdicts – or, the people's mandate. Such a scheme would have been made to work in Sri Lanka as well, given time.
There is now a need to evolve a 'Tamil consensus' just as the TNA is demanding – and justifiably so – a Sinhala consensus. Given the realities of the existing military situation, which cannot be wished away either, the when and how of it have become as important as the why and which of it, if not more.
Just as there are differences within the Sinhala polity about giving, there could be differences within the contemporary Tamil polity on 'taking'. Various views would come to be expressed on the need for 'power-sharing' with the Sinhala polity just as there could still be demands for a separate nation-State, which many Tamil parties have already abjured. A middle-path needs to be found, and there could be none better than the TNA, with the blessings and involvement of the LTTE, if it came to that, to initiate a game plan of the kind. Despite the known LTTE proclivities and priorities, fellow Tamil groups may still expect it to prove its sincerity, as much as they together expect it from the Sri Lankan State, the Colombo Government and the Sinhala polity.
After all, the non-LTTE Tamil polity would not want the LTTE to use them to buy time on the war-front and then go back on its word at a militarily more opportune time. It is all about trust, and trust is what is deficient in and with the Tamil community and polity – as they have in the Sinhala polity and the Sri Lankan State.
- Sri Lanka Guardian
___________________
by N. Sathiyamoorthy
(July 15, Chennai, Sri Lanka Guardian) Reports quoting the Sri Lankan Government's Peace Secretariat that future talks with the LTTE would include all the Tamil political parties should not come as a surprise to anyone. Combined with TMVP leader Karuna's assertion that some top Government officials were attempting to split the party, the Peace Secretariat's announcement should set all Tamil groups re-thinking on their strategies from the past and tactics for the future. There is truth in the Tamils' claim – reiterated recently by TNA's R Sampanthan -- that a 'southern Sinhala consensus' was a pre-requisite for any meaningful negotiations leading to a political settlement.
It is becoming equally, if not even more important that for such a settlement to work on ground, there needs to be not only a consensus, but also a commonality of approach in the polity. If anything, they are already united in their goals it is on the approach road that they have taken different routes. Many sections of the Tamil polity and the community strongly see a continuing 'Sinhala conspiracy' to remain politically divided all the time, if only to ensure that the Tamils were not given their due, in terms of power-devolution. For all this however the Tamils need to concede that they too are at fault, and precisely on the same grounds. From the word, 'Go', the Tamil community had remained divided . Worse still, there are more political divisions within the linguistic minorities compared to the majority community. For the divisions within themselves, based on regions and sub-regions, caste and class, not to mention personality problems, the Tamils in general and sections of the Tamil polity and intelligentsia in particular would want to blame the Sinhala polity.
The argument would go that it was the majority Sinhala community that had split the Tamils . They would not want to believe, nor accept that the Tamils were ever ready to be split – and that was why they got split.
The less said about the plight of the Tamil-speaking Muslims, the better. It's particularly so after the LTTE began claiming to be the sole-arbiter of the Tamil-speaking people, and also enforced it ruthlessly. Worse still is the case of the Tamils killing Tamils in the name of claiming equality with the Sinhala majority.
It is another matter that the Tamil polity was divided long before the LTTE began silencing contradictory political opinion from within the community. The rival ranks have remained, at times dormant, but often multiplying to add new shades of Tamil societal and political opinion opposed not to the LTTE's views but to its ways.
The Tamils – and by this, the reference is to all Tamil-speaking population in Sri Lanka -- cannot expect from the Sinhalas, or any other, what they do not give themselves in the first place – unity, that is.
For close to a year now, the LTTE leadership has been constantly and repeatedly calling upon the world's Tamils, numbering 80 million, to come to the "aid of the party". But as the typographer would tell you, test-typing the other half – the first half of the popular phrase -- "now is the time for all good men" in the Tamil community, to come to their own aid, instead.
In all this, the role and contribution of the LTTE cannot be wished away. It needs to acknowledge its own contribution to the creation of a separate Tamil polity in the East, and also of a deeper urge for a separate 'Tamil-speaking Muslim political identity'.
It was the indifference of the vociferous and more powerful sections of the Sri Lankan Tamil community to the plight of the Malayaha Tamils at the turn of Independence that forced the likes of late Soumyamurthi Thondaman to maintain a separate political course for the former. It was the violent attacks by the LTTE, then under the leadership of 'Col' Karuna in the East, that was behind current apprehensions about the radicalisation of the Muslim youth.
Since then, Karuna, for instance, has had complaints against the LTTE leadership, and complaints against the Government. It is no different in the case of other sections of the polity of the Tamil-speaking community in the country. Even the four member constituents of the LTTE-sympathetic Tamil Nationalist Alliance (TNA) have found the need or justification to merge their political identity into one long after they came under one umbrella, as a single-issue entity in parliamentary democracy.
It had all started with the TULF precursor to the TNA, and it has not changed with the TNA, either – not to leave out the non-LTTE/anti-LTTE sections of the Tamil polity. It is their 'conviction' that the LTTE was the only answer to the moods, motives and methods of the Sri Lankan State that has differentiated the TNA from other sections of the Tamil polity.
In the numbers game that is at the bottom of electoral majorities the democratic world, nearly 45 members that the Tamil-speaking sections have in the 225-seat Sri Lankan Parliament is saying a lot. At this late at the very least, the LTTE needs to acknowledge that it had not been able to find the answers that it had sought for a unified leadership for an undivided Tamil community. The Tamils cannot preach to the Sinhalese one thing, and practice another themselves. In what is seen as a Tamil prescription for absorbing the Tamil-speaking Muslim community into their fold, for instance, equity and equality are phrases that have found a repeated mention in one form or the other – and in one way or the other.
There is no denying the denials meted out to the Tamils by the majority Sinhala community. With the international community seriously engaged in Sri Lanka's ethnic issue, unlike at the time of 'Sinhala only' and 'Standardisation', the Tamil polity cannot afford to harp on the past eternally. The Indo-Sri Lanka Accord was the first such effort aimed at addressing the Tamil concerns, but it was thwarted by the moderate TULT and militant LTTE, claiming to act for the Tamils but acting independently. Little did they realise that the greater complexity of the Indian domestic situation had still produced solutions acceptable to all communities and implemented through parliamentary legislation, executive orders, or court verdicts – or, the people's mandate. Such a scheme would have been made to work in Sri Lanka as well, given time.
There is now a need to evolve a 'Tamil consensus' just as the TNA is demanding – and justifiably so – a Sinhala consensus. Given the realities of the existing military situation, which cannot be wished away either, the when and how of it have become as important as the why and which of it, if not more.
Just as there are differences within the Sinhala polity about giving, there could be differences within the contemporary Tamil polity on 'taking'. Various views would come to be expressed on the need for 'power-sharing' with the Sinhala polity just as there could still be demands for a separate nation-State, which many Tamil parties have already abjured. A middle-path needs to be found, and there could be none better than the TNA, with the blessings and involvement of the LTTE, if it came to that, to initiate a game plan of the kind. Despite the known LTTE proclivities and priorities, fellow Tamil groups may still expect it to prove its sincerity, as much as they together expect it from the Sri Lankan State, the Colombo Government and the Sinhala polity.
After all, the non-LTTE Tamil polity would not want the LTTE to use them to buy time on the war-front and then go back on its word at a militarily more opportune time. It is all about trust, and trust is what is deficient in and with the Tamil community and polity – as they have in the Sinhala polity and the Sri Lankan State.
- Sri Lanka Guardian
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