Midnight ‘resettlement’ of IDPs for Basil-show

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 July 2011, 08:38 GMT]
IDPs from Vadamaraadchi East (a former LTTE controlled region) affected by the war and were staying in the Raamaavil camp near Kodikaamam for more than two years were all of a sudden ordered to vacate the camp immediately by Saturday midnight and were herded by the occupying SL Army into military vehicles, after telling them that they would be ‘resettled’ in their villages in Vadamaraadchi East. They are at present staying in a school building in Vadamaraadchi East, without any food or facilities. They were ordered to go to their abandoned and dilapidated houses within three days and ‘live’ there. The reason for the overnight operation executed in an inhuman way was that the visiting presidential sibling Basil Rajapaksa wanted to make a show of enacting ‘resettlement’, news sources in Jaffna said.

The occupying Army closed the Raamaavil camp by 1 AM Sunday.

The IDPs of the camp are to be resettled in the villages Poakka’ruppu, Kaddaikkaadu, Veththilaikkea’ni and Keavil in Vadamaraadchi East.

The SL Army that came to the camp by 8 PM on Saturday told them first to be prepared to leave on Sunday morning. But the Army again came by midnight, ordered the people to vacate immediately and forcefully herded them into the military vehicles.

They were taken to the school at Keavil and were left there without any food or facilities.

They were then hurriedly herded to a ‘resettlement’ meeting addressed by Basil Rajapaksa who came in the company of SL colonial governor for the North, Maj. Gen. Chandrasri and SL minister Douglas Devananda.

The meeting took place by mid noon on Sunday in a shed made for the occasion at Veththilaikkea’ni.

People attended the meeting, without even food given to them felt that they were treated like non-human showpieces for the occasion. The children suffering from hunger were seen much tired.

The villages of the camp inmates were severely afflicted in the war and most of the people see just traces of their houses there. But they are now ordered to go and live there within three days.

Meanwhile, in another Basil-show on Saturday, equipments already donated to schools were taken back to re-donate them through the hands of Basil Rajapaksa.

Sometimes back, the SL military-controlled administration of Northern Provincial Council has donated pianos and computers to schools in Jaffna. They were hurriedly taken back and were brought to Veampadi Girls College to re-donate them to the principals of schools through Basil in a function organized by the Northern Provincial Council on Saturday.

On the same day, a large number of private nursery school teachers were brought to Veerasingham Hall in Jaffna with promises of SL government job and salary, to attend to a meeting addressed by Basil Rajapaksa.

Basil Rajapaksa exercises aim at the civic elections for town and village councils scheduled in the north on July 23 and he engages in an unfair campaign, while the TNA is prevented from campaigning after a brutal attack on its meeting by the occupying SL Army, political observers in Jaffna said.

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