Political confusion in Colombo said undermining peace

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 June 2003, 20:04 GMT]
"It would be absolutely imprudent on our part to predicate the future of the Tamil people on the unpredictable political climate we are witnessing in Colombo now. It is getting progressively unstable. A politically powerful section of the Sinhala Buddhist clergy asserts that President Kumaratunga wowed during a meeting with its leaders that she would divide the Northeast province. The political bankruptcy of the Sri Lankan state in solving the ethnic conflict never stood so well exposed," said Mr. Selvam Adaikalanathan, MP, a senior leader of the Tamil National Alliance, Thursday.

The MP said that the President, given the circumstances, might not hesitate to dissolve the Parliament sooner than later.

"Nevertheless, the Sri Lankan government expects the LTTE to just carry on, toeing the peace line unconditionally," he said.

Explaining his stand further, Mr. Adaikalanathan said: "In the past the Sinhala polity was always able to convince everybody including many politically minded Tamil intellectuals that it was somehow possible ultimately to find a federal solution to the conflict.

"Today the letters written by the LTTE outlining the reasons why it cannot accept the interim mechanisms proposed by Sri Lankan government have exposed the fact that the Sri Lankan constitution is so inflexible that even an transitional arrangement to stabilise the peace process is not possible under its provisions."

"Earlier, in every instance of negotiating a political settlement with the Sri Lankan government Tamil leaders failed miserably in spite of their much-vaunted legal prowess to expose the utter bankruptcy of the Sinhala polity and the obdurate nature of the legal instruments which gave it the sole, inalienable right to legislate, administer and adjudicate the island’s affairs and control its national wealth."

"Instead they helped the Sri Lankan state, wittingly or unwittingly, to cultivate the impression that it was 'reasonable.'

"It is now time for the Tamil polity to relentlessly expose the utter inflexibility of Sri Lanka's constitution and the unwillingness of the Sinhala polity to operate beyond its irremediably constricting parameters with a genuine view to bringing the conflict to an end permanently.

"The crux of the problem is that control over the country's national wealth is inalienably concentrated in the hands of the Sinhala majority despite the fact that Tamils contribute a fare share in creating the island's national wealth.

"Similarly the right to legislate, administer and adjudicate too are confined to the Sinhala majority," the MP said.

Meanwhile, Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham, TNA Parliamentarian for Batticaloa, told TamilNet that the Sri Lankan President allowed the merger to continue for seven years.

"What is the sudden reason that she has found for de-merging of the northeast?" he asked.

"This shows that Sinhala political leaders at several levels are ready to scuttle the peace process in the pursuit of their individual political agendas," Mr. Pararajasingham.