The fundamental reason behind seeking devolution is to enable people of the provinces to be empowered. Having said that we find that in practice no such empowerment has taken place. 70 year plus Northern province Chief Minister lived all his life in Colombo and went to live in the North only after Prabakaran’s demise and the announcement of elections in 2012. The Eastern Province Chief Minister of late embroiled in a controversy involving the public humiliation of the armed forces is himself from Colombo. So what is this devolution talk that is being promoted? Is devolution a means of advancing the political careers of minority politicians by parachuting them to the provinces as Chief Ministerial nominees and thereafter promote them to make demands that have nothing to do with what the people in those areas really need, want or desire? Vaddukkodai Resolution has been parachuted from Colombo to the North. The People of the North have not demanded separatism. Those demanding separatism dont live in the North (Tamil Nadu politicos, LTTE Diaspora)
Why is this fact kept hidden by media? Those who are preaching about devolution must object to outsiders suddenly arriving and pretending to have lived in that province and speaking on behalf of the people who they never knew existed when they were happily living in Colombo?
The best example is justice Wigneswaran. He was born in Colombo in 1939. He spent the first 9 years of his life in Kurunegala. At age 11 he was admitted to the prestigious Royal College in Colombo. He obtained a BA from the University of London and LLB from the University of Ceylon. He joined the Ceylon Law College and became a proctor and advocate. He was President of the Law Student’s Union in 1962. He went on to become a magistrate, a judge of the District Court, High Court and Court of Appeal and finally a judge of the Supreme Court. Doesn’t anybody for a flicker wonder how C V Wigneswaran could come up in life and career to be a Supreme Court judge if there was discrimination against the minorities by the Sinhalese? Does no one question this?
So how does a man living in Colombo feel what the people of the Northern Province feel? Let us remind all that the nomination of CV Wigneswaran as CM candidate was not welcomed and TNA leader and India had to do much to insist on Wigneswaran’s candidature against Mavai Senathirajah.
How can Wigneswaran be the mouthpiece of the Tamil people for throughout the entirety of LTTE defacto rule did he ever once come out against the LTTE and on behalf of the mothers from whom LTTE plucked out children to turn into child soldiers? Did Wigneswaran and present day TNA leaders issue one statement in opposition of the LTTE? Did they even once write letters to the international community asking them to save ‘their people’ from the LTTE?
Let us remind everyone again in particular the UN, the foreign envoys, India and even the Sri Lankans who have got a little confused of late. Sri Lanka’s military action was not against the Tamil people but against an internationally proscribed terrorist group known as the LTTE. This terrorist group was responsible for killing Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims, Burghers and even foreigners. It was to save the citizens of Sri Lanka from murder and mayhem that the LTTE was ordered to be annihilated. This is where reference to Sri Lanka’s conflict as an ethnic conflict needs to end. Sri Lanka’s conflict was terrorist and nothing else. The ethnic groups live in harmony and have been in harmony even throughout LTTE rule.
Again we need to clarify that the 1983 riots was not ethnic either. Sinhalese did not attack Tamils. The UNP thugs who comprised Sinhalese, Muslims and Tamil underworld attacked Tamils and the Tamils were saved by the Sinhalese. This distortion also needs to be cleared. UNP is responsible for the riots and the men who ransacked homes and caused mayhem were UNP hired thugs of all ethnic groups who looted houses and shops thereafter.
We return to the much hyped appeals for devolution and when it comes out from the mouth of C V Wigneswaran it is indeed humorous. Here is a man living virtually all his life outside of the North who goes to reside in the North only after 2012 when elections have been announced. He is safe to travel to the North because the LTTE is now eliminated and there is no threat on his life and thereafter he is crying crocodile tears for the people of the North. It is quite hilarious when you put the truth in context. The situation is really no different to the non-Tamil politicians in Tamil Nadu who are demanding Tamil Eelam for Tamils because it is an excellent political campaign tool and publicity stunt as well.
Every aspect of Sri Lanka’s ‘problem’ is manufactured by people who have no real lineage to it. The argument of devolution rests on the premise that people of the area wish to decide on matters important to them. The key operational word is ‘people of the area’. So why should Wigneswaran or any other Chief Minister who has not been domiciled in the areas even for 2 years decide on what people who are living in those areas should feel or want? It is quite absurd when people living in Colombo parachute themselves to the North and then tell the world what the people want for in essence it is not what the people want or even asked for but what he and those funding him want. Is it so difficult for people to understand this aspect?
With the two Chief Ministers of the North & East thinking they are the God’s gift to the areas they now hold portfolios in and throw their weight on the armed forces humiliating and degrading them in public, we can but remind them that both these characters would never have become Chief Ministers if the LTTE had not been vanquished and elections held in the North. It would be good if both re-imagined how life would have been for them if LTTE and Prabakaran prevailed. Perhaps it is good for all others to imagine life pre-May 2009 too.
Shenali D Waduge
srilankaopinion 