( May 16, 2013, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The recent actions of the Sri Lankan government and the statements made by their chauvinist components makes one wonder whether the Rajapaksa State is moving towards reconciliation or is it working out a strong case for the justification for separation.
The Bodu Bala Sena protected and patronised by the Rajapaksas have met with impunity gone about, during the past year, attacking the Muslim community, their places of worship and their way of life both in action and words. Quite unprovoked. The latest was the arrest of Azath Salley who "has been campaigning to end oppressive practices against minorities in Sri Lanka, in particular Muslims and Tamils, for which he has faced the ire of the Sri Lankan government" says Dr. Vickramabahu Karunarathne, an intellectual and a highly credible left politician.
President Mahinda Rajapaksa has either lost control of the members of his family, his own Party the military forces, the government, the component members of the ruling sections or his mind. It appears that there is no explanation for this malaise. There is chaos in Sri Lanka, which has become a land of contradictions in all aspects of its life and in all sections of its society. Impunity, murders, abductions, disappearances, attacks on dissent and free speech reign to mention a few that rule the roost.
Azath Salley who was promoting unity between the Tamils and the Muslim community promoting reconciliation between the two as an integral part of the overall reconciliation of all races in Sri Lanka was arrested under the provisions of the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act at a time when it is claimed that Tamil terrorism has been defeated and laid to rest. However, the Rajapaksas in order to keep alive the potential threat of the emergence of Tamil terrorism to strengthen the position of their rule and that of the fledgling upstart dynasty, had to arrest a Muslim who was trying to forge unity amongst the Muslims and the Tamils a component part and precursor to overall reconciliation. It would be recalled that a few years ago a well-known Tamil journalist Tissanayagam was arrested under the provisions of the same Act and imprisoned to be later released upon international pressure for there were no valid legal grounds for his incarceration.
To an intelligent and discerning observer it would appear that what Salley said was the translation of his apprehension of the anticipated outcome of Sinhala chauvinism. If Salley was arrested for promoting communal hatred then organisations like the Bodu Bala Sena and other similar nationalistic chauvinist outfits promoting hatred against the ethnic and religious sections of the Tamil-speaking minorities should have been arrested ten times over. It appears that the Prevention of Terrorism Act as obtaining in Sri Lanka is enforced only on the ethnic minorities. Salley has now been released and it is claimed by the government media that his request for a pardon had been granted. Nothing, we are told could be further from the truth. We are informed that he never asked for a pardon.
Currently the sore point amongst the Sinhala polity is the holding of the provincial council elections in the north as grudgingly "promised" by Rajapaksa to be held in September 2013 preceding the CHOGM conference in November. President Rajapaksa would wait for the slightest excuse to put it off permanently and let the north be continued to be ruled by the repressive military although the Tamil cabinet minister Devananda, a wanted criminal in India, used as a show piece being a very bad advertisement for the government for want of a better one, exhibited as part of Tamil civil society for international publicity but actually a thorn on their side with civil and military powers in the north centralised in himself. In actual fact, we are told that the Rajapaksas would rather prefer to do without Devananda if they could find an alternate substitute.
Already Devananda has demonstrated his remonstrance to legitimate opportunities of representation of the Tamil people in the north in the attacks carried out against some of the prospective candidates of the Tamil National Alliance the de facto legitimate representatives of the Tamils.
On the other hand the Rajapaksas' certainly entertain the clamour by the Sinhala Buddhist chauvinists who are supporters and components of their regime like the Bodu Bala Sena, the National Movement to Safeguard the (Sinhala Buddhist) Nation, the rabid racist Minister in Vimal Weerawansa a leader of a component ruling party who in addressing the May Day rally of his party stated that he was opposed to the elections in the North, as it would lead to the creation of a separate state by the Tamil National Alliance.
The Jathika Hela Urumaya led by Minister Champika Ranawaka a renowned racist and a Sinhala Buddhist nationalist and the Jathika Nidhas Peramuna have also registered their protest against the holding of the Provincial council elections on the grounds, amongst others, that no election can be considered democratic, if it deprives the basic right of constituents meaning the Sinhalese who are eligible to cast their votes because they constituted 4.5 per cent while the Muslims were 4-3 in 1971 according to the 1971 government population census. Ridiculous, this being 2013 and not 1971. Entertaining dangers accruing from the 13th Amendment they state: "It is true that the Provincial Council system is embedded in our Constitution and the government is duty bound to implement it" and further: "...... without curtailing the Police, land, environment, energy and certain other legislative powers vested in Provincial Council Act, it is prudent not to establish any provincial council, which would be anti-State and neo-Nazi, in essence". They also entertain apprehensions that, the Tamil National Alliance will use the Northern Provincial Council election as a referendum for endorsing its right to self-determination.
The question is when will these chauvinist nationalist sections be ready for reconciliation, which is a mirage held out to the international community to put them off the track.
It is paramount that the Tamil peoples if they are to be considered an integral part of the country should not be deprived of their legitimate right to elect the representatives of their choice uninhibited and should be afforded equal opportunities. It appears that, if at all the elections are to be held being a remote possibility under the circumstances, there could be thuggery, violence, murder, disappearances, arrests and the like to prevent the Tamil people from electing their representatives of their true choice, reminiscent of the irreparable damage done to the Tamil people and their ethos at the development council elections in 1981. The development councils held out as vehicles of devolution were themselves a farce.
It is also of great concern that not only has there been absolutely no attempt to either placate or appease the displaced Tamil people in the recognition of their traditional home lands let alone their own little parcels of land as important economic units but also when displaced Tamils attempt to enter their land they are denied access. The military in the process of building their own empire occupy and cultivate these very plots of land. They are also active in the process of compulsorily taking over thousands of acres of private cultivable lands of the northern Tamils which are small holdings in most of which crops are rotated.
It must be borne in mind that the Tamil people detest the betrayal of a cause whatever it be, or by whosoever it is. It is a lesson having come down from 1949. We are saying this because we gather that sections of the government have started wooing persons who had been affiliated to the LTTE, now said to be under "rehabilitation" and others made of straw to enter the fray on behalf of the government.
The Tamil people, however, humble they may be, by and large, hold integrity to be integral. If the powers that be have not learnt this so far then it is time they do so at least by now before it is too late, if they are genuinely interested in reconciliation.
- The writer is the editor of the Eelam Nation, an online journal
- The writer is the editor of the Eelam Nation, an online journal
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