Asoka (Weerasinghe) Kings Grove Crescent . Gloucester . Ontario . Canada

29 August 2020

Mr. Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, LL.B (London)
Leader of the Tamil National Peoples’ Front (TNPF)
Member Parliament for Jaffna
Parliament of Sri Lanka 
Kotte
Sri Lanka

Dear Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam:

Permit me to introduce myself to you, as you might wonder who this guy is, who calls himself Weera-sinha (Courageous-Lion), born and bred in Colombo.  Born at 54 Mount Mary off Baseline Road.  Son of a Ceylon Government Railway Steam Locomotive Engine Driver.  A Sinhalese-Buddhist to boot, who was schooled at Nalanda (Vidyalaya) College, and left home for London, England, on 3 December 1956, on a British BOAC 56 seater propeller DC4 plane from Ratmalana Airport.  It took 41 hours for me to reach Heathrow.  And I met your Dad some time in the early 1960s, when he was brought to my home (flat) at 51 Faraday Road, Ladbroke Grove, in London, for a cup of tea, by our  mutual  friend, a Quantity Surveyor, Balasubramaniam.

And do you know what Gajendra, after all these 64 years away from home, I am still romancing my beautiful Motherland, Sri Lanka, who gave me a free education to make me who I am today — a Geologist-Palaeontologist-Museologist.  And this is important for you to know.  I am on a Mission in Canada – that no one, absolutely no one, and that includes you, will spit at, and kick her when she is down, and harm her with God-damn lies unfairly,  spitting out words like, Genocide, Discrimination, Persecution, and Human Rights Violations of the Tamils. 

Gajendrakumar when I mean no one, it means,  not even the Prime Minister of Canada.   All the Prime Ministers since August 1983, have heard my voice loud and clear, like that of the sound of the chime of London’s Big Ben at noon,  when their statements hurt my Sinhalese psyche, my Sri Lankan-conscience and for the love of that beautiful island.

So I question your gall and temerity to stand up in the well of the Sri Lankan Parliament chambers and reiterate Genocide allegations.  So I seek help for you from Sweet Mother of Jesus”, to help this Tamil politician, who seems to have a skewed  understanding of the active word,Genocide”.

Gajendrakumar, well son, what is reassuring about my past is that all of this has happened.  And I am sure that you who have lived in London will share my sentiments:

‘From  Hyde Park’s fog, a white-man walks out

preaching mnemonic fears of love… and shouts

I’ve painted white…I’ve painted black

 I’ve painted white upon the blacks’.

With all that crap that you and I had to endure, we don’t have to crap at each other  with exaggerated, Humbugging lies which you had just done in Parliament.  I just don’t like it. It annoyed me and got my goat and told myself  ...O! No!! There comes another lying Tamil cunning-politician.

And that’s when it hit me when I told myself – O! No,  I will not allow that cunning Fox, G.G. Ponnambalam, nor a member of his progeny, to try his 50-50 stunt to give the 10 percent of the island’s Tamil people a chance to govern the 70 percent of my Sinhalese people, on a separatist Tamilian- whim. 

At that point Gajendrakumar, it occurred to me that you Tamils have had difficulty to give up your ‘privileged minority’ status you all enjoyed during the 131 years of colonial rule, and couldn’t care a tuppence about the professionalism, dignity and social status of the wronged majority”, the Sinhalese, during that 131 years of Colonial rule. Right Gajendrakumar!

Nor will I allow GG’s progeny, who pride in their initials LL.B behind their names,  to try the cunning tricks of the Grandad to dissect my Mother Lanka into two, with cunning lies as we are children of the same Mother of Lanka as she had adopted you lot as her sons and daughters who had come over the 18 miles divide of salt-water in the Palk Strait.

So I hope you got my drift, and I will say it my way, as I am not good at playing ‘Hide and Seek’ with the Tamil community, or throw riddles at you to solve them.  I am a straight ‘face-to-face’ talker.

I say to you, Gajendrakumar, don’t  do anything stupid to wipe out another generation of Tamil youngsters by picking a war with the majority’Sinhalese and their Government. It is not  worth it.

This is how I see it Gajendrakumar, and I am sure you see it my way too:

This corpse speaks to me
still warm and its mouth foams
with his Mother’s milk.

A medallion of a misplaced
courage of drying blood
stuck to his chest after a flood of blood
where a bullet had pierced
in the assault cracking dark.

I am tired carrying
around your mother’s tears
washed with her breast-milk
which were your afternoon feed.

And I see all around you others strewn
hastily like poppy-chested flowers
with eyes of executed children…

sent to the Front line with
cyanide capsules strung around
their necks by adults in Tiger-khaki
 who live in safety in brick-houses
and gunny-bags full with rice-paddy
walled bunkers.

So join me Gajendrakumar and sing with me the joy of sharing,  harmony and freedom…yes, let’s hold hands as we could harmonize better –  I will count, one – two- three, and then we will start together. Alright!   Here we go now – 1 – 2 – 3

This land is your land and this land is my land
From Point Pedro to  Dondra Head,
from the plush Tea gardens, to the Mahaweli waters,
this land was made for you and me.

As I went walking the A9 Highway
I saw the endless Kandy-Jaffna skyway
I saw below me, sapphire-gravel valleys
as this land was made for us, you and me.

If you still have intentions to chop it into two
you are free to go back to Tamil Nadu
your Motherland where 75 million
of your brothers and sisters
are waiting anxiously to embrace you. 

While all voices around us were singing;
Halleluja..Halleluja…Halleluja,
Vaarungal…vaarungal…..vaarungal…
Namo…namo…Matha…..uppergay Sri Lanka Matha…”
and while the sun was switching off for the day
the Tamil and Sinhalese voices were still chanting,’
This land was made for us, You and Me.”

As a final note from WikiLeaks, which makes you look like a weak-kneed cunning junior GG-Fox. Here is what it said:

The Colombo Telegraph found the related leaked cable from the WikiLeaks database.  The ‘Confidential” cable discusses what had happened on the ground during and since the conflict.  The cable was signed by the U.S.Ambassador to Geneva Clint Williamson on July 15, 2009.

After the meeting with Jacque de Maio, ICRC Head of Operations for South Asia on July 9, 2009. Just two months after the war, the ambassador wrote; The army was determined not to let the LTTE escape from its shrinking territory, even though this meant the civilians being kept hostage by the LTTE were at increasing risk.  So, de Maio said, while one could safely say that there were ‘serious widespread violations of IHL,’ by the Sri Lankan Forces, it did not amount to Genocide.  He could cite examples of where the army had stopped shelling when ICRC informed them it was killing civilians.  In fact, the army actually could have won the military battle faster with higher civilian casualties, yet chosen have won the military battle faster with higher civilian casualties, yet chosen a slower approach which led to a greater number of Sri Lankan military deaths….”

So there you are Gajendrakumar.  It doesn’t look good on you, does it?  You have three choices.

It is up to you to use this information judiciously thus guarding your integrity, your decency and shield your credibility as a lawyer-politician; or tear the piece of paper that it is printed on and throw it into a waste-paper basket; or roll it into a cigar and smoke it.  The choice is entirely yours.

Take care Gajendrakumar and be Wise.

May the Devas: Ganesha, Durga, Sarasvathi,
Vishnu and Lakshmi  protect you.
Sadhu…sadhu….sadhu.

Warmly

Asoka (Weerasinghe)