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Solutions based on 13th Amendment - Have we taken for a ride?

Dharmasena Liyanage

The so-called All Party Representative Committee (or quite rightly called Fourteen Party Representative Committee), in its interim report, has recommended strengthening the 13th amendment made to the constitution and is expected to provide maximum devolution to the Northern and Eastern Provinces in due course.

As per Section 1.1 of the report, the devolution proposals are yet to come and implementation of those proposals will require amendment of the present Constitution, and in respect of some Articles, approval by the people at a referendum. Hence, no doubt, the proposals, not yet reviled, are expected to go beyond the 13th amendment.

As per section 1.2 of the report, it is said that the emphasis would be on meeting the 'aspirations of the Tamil speaking people, especially in the North and East'. It seems, JHU leaders and the MEP guru in the APRC have now realised that there are aspirations of Tamil speaking people in Northern and Eastern Provinces and the best solution is to strengthen the provincial councils initiated as per the Indo-Lanka pact signed in 1987, in contrary to their own preaching for decades. The JHU leaders and the MEP guru have taken 20 years to become 'enlighten' in their attempt to find the course of conflict and to find a noble path to 'permanent peace'. How strange!

As per section 3.3, an Interim Council is to be established reflecting the ethnic character of the Northern Province. Since almost all Sinhalese have been chased away from the Northern Province by the Tamil racist groups and the subsequent governments have failed to keep any records and have completely ignored the issue of displaced Sinhalese, it is interesting to see how this interim council will be established reflecting the ethnicity in the Province and how many Sinhala people are going to benefit by the proposal under the current situation prevailing in the province.

Indo-Lanka relations fell to its lowest level after 1977, mainly due to the short-sighted policies adopted by the UNP government, and Indian cargo planes invaded Sri Lanka territory challenging the sovereignty of our country, and almost forced JR to 'invite' Rajiv Gandhi to Sri Lanka to sign the agreement and to 'invite' IPKF. The Government of Sri Lanka had no other alternative but to 'surrender' to the India's demands and signed the hurriedly prepared document without a proper consent from the people of the country. The JR-Rajiv Pact was signed amidst curfew and the function was boycotted by the then Prime Minister R. Premadasa and cabinet ministers including Lalith Athulathmudali who was in-charged of the Defence. Political parties such as, SLFP, JVP, MEP, including a section of the UNP, were against the agreement and the opposition to the treacherous agreement was notable when a sailor attacked the Indian PM when the latter was receiving the guard of honour.

The 13th amendment to the constitution was made as a condition of the JR-Rajiv agreement and those UNP parliamentarians who opposed the agreement had no other alternative but to vote for the amendment since JR had already made them his 'political hostages' by keeping undated resignation letters signed by MPs in his custody. The only gentleman parliamentarian who had the backbone to resign in protest and leave politics was late Mr Gamini Jayasooriya. The JR-Rajiv agreement accepted the theory of Tamil Homelands which is an absolute treachery and many argued that the Provincial Council system, if implemented in full, will lead to a Federal system. Even the Supreme Court was divisive when making its decision on the constitutionality of the amendment and was passed with a marginal majority of one.

It is under this background that the parties opposed to the Provincial Councils, boycotted the first elections of the Provincial Councils. The very first North-East Provincial Council ended up after its Chief Minister Vardarajah Perumal declared Unilateral Independence prior to his departure to Indian hideout, all that have been forgotten by our short-sighted power hungry politicians with time.

The so-called UNP (D) group, which is made up of hardcore campaigners of a Federal system for a quite long time and who were vociferous critics of ' Mahinda Chinthanaya' at the last presidential election is gradually achieving their ulterior motives by entering the government through the backdoor. People like G.L Peiris, Rajitha Senarathne appear to be back in the driving seat, promoting the APRC report, after a brief silence on devolution.

Although there are 14 signatories to the APRC report, some of the parties are only name board parties with no real public representation. Since UNP (D) is not a registered political party and appeared as one of the political parties, one could argue that the APRC document itself is not a legally valid document.

It is truly unbelievable, outrageous and shocking that the party which preached and pretend to stand for our National Heritage called 'Jathika Hela Urumaya' and we supported from its formative years, could have descended to such a low level to betray the whole patriotic movement and our heritage just for a ministerial position. In fact, the statements made by the SLFP, JHU and MEP heavyweights as to why the parties changed their instance and agreed to find 'solution' through the existing law or 13th amendment are incredibly ridiculous and an insult to the ordinary citizens who genuinely followed their party leaderships up to now, believing them as national heroes.

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