Political Solution : Empty Gesture and No Takers

"The interim measure is no more than the handing over of the northern council to Devananda and the eastern one to Karuna or Pillyan. It is bound to be a sitting duck to any terrorist movement as would require a dominant presence of the security forces. It can well be part of the military solution President MR has chosen for himself."

by Batty Weerakoon

(January 27, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Air Force bunker-busters may hopefully get Prabhakaran if they have not got him already. But P dead or alive is not really the problem. It is the repeated failure of the south to offer to the Tamil community a feasible political solution to its civic and human rights issues that is in fact the besetting problem. In this context P is no more than a megalomaniac claiming the Tamil community as his exclusive turf. The Tamil community can in no way grin and bear this impossible situation, but as LTTE terror is principally directed at this very community it has no option but to sink into silence.

District Development Councils

In this situation of the Tamil community (TC hereafter) successive SL governments have played into LTTE hands. JRJ offered elected District Development Councils with chairmen nominated by him, no doubt a phoney measure as it proved to be, but the TC accepted it. It ended with the burning of the Jaffna public library and all Jaffna bazzars on a single night.

The next try out was devolution of political power through provincial councils. Though the scheme had been finalized by the All Party Conference summoned by JRJ in 1984 it was not implemented till the Indian intervention forced the enactment of the system through the 13th Amendment to the Constitution (1987). But it too failed in the North and the East when JRJ's successor summarily got rid of the peace keeping / monitoring IPKF and told Chief Minister Vartharaja Perumal where to get off. With that the LTTE took over the NE region as its liberated zone. All communities in the region including the TC were thereafter placed at the mercy of the LTTE.

APC fiasco

The fiasco of the APC summoned by President MR only proves to the TC the truth of P's "Heroes Day" (November 2006) observation that this august body was meant to fool the Tamil people. The APC was hamstrung from the start in that a committee nominated by the respective parties with a chairperson appointed by the President took over the thankless job of finding its way to a political solution. What the committee (APRC) has finally handed over to President MR is an interim measure with the declared goal being the 13th Amendment to the Constitution (1987).

This can be faulted at both ends. The Interim Measure is no more than JRJ's District Development Council with the damning difference that it is unelected. The Council and its chairman are nominated by the President. And the final goal is the 13th Amendment which has already betrayed itself in the eyes of the TC. To say that the proposed exercise is an attempt to implement the 13th Amendment is a cynical misrepresentation. The interim measure is no more than the handing over of the northern council to Devananda and the eastern one to Karuna or Pillyan. It is bound to be a sitting duck to any terrorist movement as would require a dominant presence of the security forces. It can well be part of the military solution President MR has chosen for himself.

It cannot be imagined that the TC will be willing to accept the 13th Amendment after what it experienced with it in the late 1980s. Besides, it, is well aware that governments since then have offered genuine devolution packages as evidenced by the Constitutional Amendment Bill brought to Parliament in August 2000 by the CBK regime. It was drafted in consultation with all parties in Parliament and these included the TULF and all other "minority parties". The UNP too had endorsed it after consultations that spread over six months.

Isolation of LTTE

What President MR has got into his hands at his own bidding from an effete APRC is counter productive even in relation to his own strategy which is the rooting out of LTTE terrorism before embarking on a peace process. The sine qua non for success in such effort is the isolation of the LTTE from the TC. But MR's present move, far from isolating the LTTE, pushes the TC to the point of accepting LTTE credibility and giving it a sanctity as could trigger a genuine guerilla movement with or without a Prabhakaran. The LTTE has at all times been terrorist in approach and strategy. That was its, Achilles heel. A genuine guerilla movement may make things different in the consciousness of the Tamil community. A military solution may not be the end of the road. (26- 01- 08)