Sri Lanka's President invites JVP, CWC for talks

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 May 2005, 12:12 GMT]
Sri Lanka's President Chandrika Kumaratunga has invited two members of her ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) - the Janatha Vimukthi Perumana (JVP) and Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) - for talks at her official residence Thursday, the Daily Mirror newspaper reported. The meeting comes as the JVP seemed to back away from its confrontationist course with President Kumaratunga on thedonor-backed notion of sharing aid with the LTTE and amid speculation the matter had created a rift within the Marxist-cum-ultranationalist party.

The Daily Mirror, quoting ‘Presidential sources’ said Thursday’s talks “were intended to sort out the problems that have arisen within the UPFA.”

The agenda would include the controversial proposal for a joint mechanism with the Liberation Tigers on the tsunami aid and the Norwegian brokered peace process, the paper said.

The President’s meeting with the JVP comes after international donors who met for two days in Sri Lanka this week, promised up to three billion dollars for tsunami-related reconstruction whilst strongly pushing for progress in the peace process with the LTTE, especially a joint mechanism for aid distribution.

The JVP, which has for several months been threatening to quit the UPFA and bring down the government if it signed the deal with the LTTE, has since last week toned down its criticism.

The party, which last December was openly criticised by the exasperated co-chairs of Sri Lanka’s international donors for its hostility to the peace process, has waged a public campaign against a joint mechanism.

But it attended the Development Forum Monday and Tuesday, where it was obliquely denounced by President Kumaratunga.

Political analysts said the JVP, which has been muted in its opposition to the joint mechanism this week, is backing away from a confrontation with President Kumaratunga.

It had intended to stage a major demonstration in the hill country town of Kandy where hundreds of delegates from international donor states and agencies were meeting, but abandoned the plan, they said.

But instead, senior JVP members who are ministers in Kumaratunga’s cabinet attended the event, uncharacteristically wearing suits and ties, reports said.

Some press reports this week speculated that these departures from traditions meant elements of the JVP, which entered government for the first time last year as part of the UPFA might split and join Kumaratunga’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).

Some JVP watchers were sceptical, suggesting the party, which was all but written off after its second abortive – and incredibly bloody – insurrection was put down in the late eighties but has steadily grown into a formidable political force, was merely adapting to present realities whilst pursing its long-term ambitions.

They point out that, sensing popular sentiments – particularly within its core voters - were not inline with the JVP’s uncompromising hostility to a tsunami-aid sharing deal with the LTTE, the party was manoeuvring shrewdly.

A survey conducted by the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) said two-thirds of Sri Lankans backed a joint mechanism between with government and the LTTE for post-tsunami aid distribution.

But notably, only 50.9 percent of the majority Sinhalese backed the deal, in contrast to 93.3 percent of Tamils and 72.9 percent Muslims, suggesting the JVP was not necessarily out of step with Sinhala sentiments on deals with the Tigers.

Political analysts said the involvement of the CWC in Thursday’s talks suggest other aid conditionality, including privatisation, would be on the agenda.

The CWC has been a staunch opponent of the Upper Kotmale hydro-electric project, arguing large numbers of Estate Tamils would be adversely affected.

The CWC, which says that offering its support to the ruling coalition, irrespective of its political hue is its strategy for securing benefits for the Estate Tamil constituency, has been a partner in every government since 1977.

Having been allied with the prop-peace, market friendly United National Party (UNP) when it was in power, the CWC offered to support the UPFA last September.

Sri Lanka is bedevilled by difficulties supplying power for homes and industry.

Plans to privatise the debt-riddled Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) have been vehemently opposed by the JVP, which is backing the CEB trade unions.