No Political Solution Can Satisfy Tamil-Eelam Seekers

By Thomas Johnpulle

(March 16, London, Sri Lanka Guardian) Sri Lanka needs a political solution. Let there be no doubt about that. However, a good number of Sri Lankans other than Tamils and the international community seem unaware of the real driving force behind the Tamil Eelam struggle and it’s most expensive tool – the LTTE. Can any political solution bring about Tamil Eelam? If yes, pending the commencement of border wars and ethnic cleansing, Tamil Eelamists would call off violence. If no, nothing will change.

The saying goes, “something is better than nothing”. However, due to over 85 years of propaganda bombardment on peaceful, law abiding and innocent Tamils, a section of Tamils (the section that seeks Tamil Eelam) is adamant that Tamil Eelam must be granted to stop all anti-Sri Lankan activities. They believe that anything else is as good as nothing. This is what most other Sri Lankans cannot apprehend. Therefore their solution will be crafted without this fact and it will surely fail.

Any political solution will have to be marketed to the populace. In marketing there is a process that involves segmentation, targeting and positioning. For any marketing campaign to succeed this process must be followed properly at each stage.

Segmentation

There are different aspirations of Tamils just like any other community. Based on these as relevant to the problem, they can be segmented as follows. Please note that for proper comparison, a post-war time frame is considered and only the “ethnic problem” is addressed. Of course the ethnic problem is connected to other problems but many other problems can be solved without ethnic considerations. Therefore, the ethnic problem remains at the heart of unresolved problems and it can be analysed by its entirety without confusing with other problems.

There are at least four (4) different segments of Tamils.

Group 1: They are satisfied as things are. Also included in this group are those who simply don’t care
Group 2: They will be satisfied if reasonable power-sharing is given to Tamils.
Group 3: They will be satisfied if Tamil Eelam is given
Group 4: They will be satisfied if a definite path to Tamil Eelam is given even if Tamil Eelam is not given.

A political solution based on devolution may satisfy Group 2 and Group 1 does not pose any trouble anyway. Nevertheless Groups 1 and 2 rarely engaged in violence and separatism. Simply put it, they were never the problem and there is nothing to solve there.

On the other hand Groups 3 and 4 are the problem and they will not budge at all despite a political solution. They strongly believe that there was a separate Tamil homeland in the island of Sri Lanka historically and they should have it back. They are the main financiers of the LTTE although the others also contribute. They are the ones who pressurise the international community to save the LTTE and they are the ones with the most powerful Tamil propaganda devices around the world.

Group 1 Tamils don’t try to propagate their views and they have no media strength at all. Group 2 also takes a very lukewarm attitude towards propagating their views. However, Groups 3 and 4 are very vociferous and very active. They actively seek every opportunity that can bring them a step closer to Tamil Eelam. No political solution can satisfy them. Further, since they are not satisfied, their media power will continue to engage others trying to convert them.

This is happening not only in the Tamil Diaspora but also in Sri Lanka. You only need to read popular Tamil dailies to understand the enormous popular support the LTTE and the Tamil Elam concept get from the popular Tamil media in Sri Lanka. There is no way these popular media can be silenced or changed. Although there are allegations of trying to silence them, they are far from silenced.

Not knowing the width and breadth of the Tamil popular support for a separate nation is the biggest drawback of those who suggest solutions and why their solution will not take root.

Why didn’t the LTTE compromise?

Many have highlighted the fact that LTTE was uncompromising and that was its down fall. However, the LTTE couldn’t have compromised. Had it compromised on its stand, what is the reason for its existence?

Practically though the best option for the LTTE was to compromise it’s stand for a “solution” and build it from there. In that case the solution would have backfired on the government. Then we would be back in square one or worse. So even if the LTTE had compromised its stand just to arrive at a very temporary ‘solution’, it would have fallen to pieces soon.

LTTE’s uncompromising approach attracted praises from many quarters. As explained above, a significant section of Tamils are convinced that there was a historical Tamil homeland and they see no reason why it shouldn’t be retaken in it’s entirety.

LTTE was not the product of alleged government discrimination. It must be emphasised. Certain events did cause misery to Tamils and caused hatred but without a backdrop of existing antagonism they meant very little. The background was set before 1948 as the Tamil Eelam concept and the concept of separate Tamil existence were introduced in the 1920s. It is in this backdrop 1956, 1958, 1972, 1977, 1981 and 1983 happened. These events only strengthened the 1920s resolve.

LTTE was never against the repetition of 1958 or 1983; it actually loves riots that will further push the Tamil populace towards it. It tried to bring about riots many times after 1983 and failed. This is because such events reinforce the 1920s resolve. The simple question to ask is if riots and other alleged discrimination caused Tamils to demand a separate state, why talk of Tamil homelands?

Amirthalingam and a host of others eventually compromised on the method to get Tamil Elam and became political nobodies. The attractiveness of Tamil Elam has always prevailed over other competing options. LTTE made use of this attractiveness.

The elephantine hole in the two pronged strategy

All governments after 1983 followed the two pronged strategy of a military solution and a political solution. Needless to say all these failed. Today is a different scenario and it is clear the military solution is at the verge of its end. Government has promised a political solution immediately thereafter. Their logic is, violence should be handled militarily while the ethnic problem should be handled politically. However, there is a huge hole right in the middle of this strategy. This strategy only caters to ‘terrorists’ and Group 2 (above) segment. It leaves out Groups 3 and 4. Assuming all Tamil Elam seekers to be Tigers is a blunder of all successive governments. Even today anyone who talks about Tamil Elam is immediately branded a terrorist.

While it is not the intention here to criticise such branding, it must be emphasised that Groups 3 and 4 have a separate existence from terrorists. As a result, clamping down on terrorism doesn’t affect them at all and they will continue their work after the military victory. Due to the hardline nature of their demands, political solutions will also avoid them.

A separate strategy is required to encapsulate them in the solution. In other words the government must follow a three pronged strategy.

The Third Element

Peaceful Tamil Elam supporters who are the noisiest and busiest in Sri Lanka and in the Tamil Diaspora (Groups 3 and 4) were not recognised separately by the government. That makes it difficult to develop a solution targeting them. Those who are aware of their separate existence (from the LTTE and pro-Sri Lankan Tamils) often cut down the necessity to tackle them and hope that with the demise of the LTTE, they would give up the Tamil Eelam demand.

However, there is a genuine need to tackle them. They can spark another round of bloodshed and nurture terrorists. Alternatively they may use peaceful methods to destabilise Sri Lanka and extort what they call “Tamil homelands”. The way to block them is by making Tamil Eelam unattainable.

There are various characteristics that helped separatists and terrorists thrive. Even before the Sinhalas and Muslims were wiped out in the North, their numbers were quite small. Political parties that represented constituencies in the North never had to bother winning the votes of the Sinhalas and Muslims.

It is a great misfortune that these parties were race-based. They were fighting against each other trying to outsmart the other by being more and more communalistic. The gradual deterioration from the All Ceylon Tamil Congress to Tamil National Alliance was the direct result. Ethnic cleansing of the North and valiant attempts to do so in the East helped further the ethnic homelands concept. Today a Tamil child growing up in Jaffna would not see a Sinhala or Muslim child. This ethnic isolation and enclave building helped separatists immensely. The Tamil homelands concept coupled with the mono ethnic nature of the North and parts of the East gradually dragged these areas into war.

The solution is simple. Follow the untold success story of Colombo where peace is the norm. People of many ethnicities lead harmonious and inter-dependant lives without any racial demarcation. No one claims Colombo to be a Sinhala, Tamil or Muslim homeland. The North and the East offers ample land and resources for people of all races to settle down. Once a cosmopolitan society is created, there is no room for separatists to advance their agenda.

At start remaining terror elements would try to scare away the people but with large military garrisons in the area, things can be quickly sorted out. Exploitation of hitherto untapped resources will bring economic prosperity to all, not just one community, which motivates the furtherance of the model. It can also resolve other burning issues that were pushed under the carpet citing the war like landlessness, lack of natural resources/minerals/water, etc.

Above all it will keep Sri Lanka in one piece for future generations to live peacefully without border wars, water wars and isolation. Seekers of Tamil Eelam will be left with nothing to cling to. Then and only then will they shed th demand for a separate Tamil-only nation as it becomes impossible. This is the total solution that targets the good, bad and the ugly. -Sri Lanka Guardian