EDITORIAL: HAS SRI LANKA MADE THE RIGHT TURN AT LAST?

| by I.S. Senguttuvan

(June 02, 2012, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The Govt-owned English Daily “The Ceylon Daily News” of June 02 splashes in its front page what must be one of the most welcome pieces of news the much divided country has heard for a long time. It quotes the Governor of the bifurcated Northern Province General G.A. Chandrasiri listing a series of developmental and infra-structural projects. For the record -Jaffna District is part of the earlier North-East Province now de-merged violating the solemn Indo- Lanka Accord of 1987) The news will be received by the predominantly Tamil people of the Province with much appreciation.

The Governor confirmed over Rs.1 million on each family has been spent under the Uthruru Wasanthaya (Awakening of the North) Programme by the government to benefit the 1.5 million people of the District in the past 18 months. The areas listed are those designed to build Bridges and to repair old ones, Roads/Highways, Improved Water facilities, New Electricity lines, Hospitals, Transport services and Railway lines. Most of these are new and on-going Projects, it is claimed.

This news will be welcome not only by the people of the area but also of the entire country concerned with the decades long complaint of the people of the area being denied their share of the country's development budgets. The news will be equally welcome by our friends in the international community and the region – who have shown keen interest in many different ways in the past 30 years to see Sri Lanka regain her peace and unity.

It will serve a useful purpose f NGOs and other agencies located in the area specializing in economic matters - such as the VVT Chamber of Commerce - and the various other Trade Chambers in Jaffna, MPs as well as the political formations in the area confirm the good news after a careful study and analysis of programmes on the ground. This should ideally include dates the projects began, the nature of the projects and their value, location, details of progress made supported by photographic evidence. To a country where the people have been disappointed with merely Opening Plaques and Boards such positive evidence will go a long way to create confidence and hope.

This excellent piece of information – once confirmed by those concerned – should. ideally, receive maximum media coverage so that people in the four corners of the country are told much to heal the wounds of the past are being done by the Rajapakse regime.

The enormous and varied infra-strucutural investments followed by the many commitments by the private sector take off - some of them should have starting showing results by now - there will be much needed employment opportunities created in the overwhelmingly Tamil-populated District that saw some of its impatient youth take to arms only because they were denied equal economic opportunities. A long alienated people also will see their future role in the national political scene in a different perspective if they are to see the fruits of accelerated development enumerated by the Northern Governor.

The greatest beneficiaries of the change will be President Rajapakse and his brothers for sometime under global strictures for allegations of deliberate acts of political and economic discrimination against an important section of the once united Nation.