Two developments among minority communities

The two developments occurring among the Tamil speaking people of Sri Lanka need watching. The first is the realisation that the Tamil and Muslim political parties should unite to safeguard the basic needs of their people. The second, the consequence of the first, is the shift in their stand about the Executive Presidency.
These developments are the outcome of the process of consolidation that had happened among the Sinhala people following the war victory. The government is now talking about polling over 80 percent votes in Saturday’s Southern Provincial Council election and about obtaining two-third majority in the next parliamentary election.
APRC Chairman and Minister Tissa Vitarana told the media on Sunday that the political solution to the ethnic issue would be found only after the next parliamentary election likely to be held in March. He said that it would be easier for the government to pass a new constitution based on the APRC proposals in the new parliament in which the government expects a clear two-third majority.
In such a circumstance, minority community leaders feel that the main concern of the governing UPFA which may perhaps comprise some Sinhala chauvinistic elements would be: What can we give without endangering the interests of the Sinhala people?
This feeling is giving rise to the realisation that the Tamils and the Muslims should get together and place before the people and the country the basic needs they want to be safeguarded. A meeting held on Saturday in Colombo on the invitation of PLOTE leader Dharmalingam Siddharthan decided to determine the urgent basic needs of the Tamil speaking people, Tamils and Tamil speaking Muslim people. The other participants were: EPRLF (Pathmanabha Group), Sri Lanka Muslim Congress and Democratic People’s Front.
The meeting identified the issue of resettlement of the internally displaced Tamil and Muslim people, finding solution to the land problems of the Tamil and Muslim people, and the settlement of Sinhalese in the northern and eastern provinces as the priority matters that should be highlighted.
Joint appeal
Parallel to this development, five leading minority parties issued on Wednesday a joint appeal for the immediate release and resettlement of the thousands of Tamil and Muslim IDPs who languish in the temporary camps in the various parts of the country. The signatories of this joint appeal were: TULF president V. Anandasangaree, Democratic People’s Front leader Mano Ganeshan, Akhila IlankaiTamil United Front leader K. Vigneswaran, Sri Lanka Muslim Congress president Rauff Hakeem and Tamil National Alliance leader R. Sampanthan.
The crucial paragraph of the appeal reads:
“These people should be released immediately to return to their homes and permitted to resume without hindrance their livelihood activities such as farming and fishing, or take up residence with their friends and relatives, or to exercise their lawful right to abode elsewhere at their discretion. Those likely to face criminal charges should be produced in a court of law without further delay.”
The stress of the appeal is that IDPs be allowed to return to their homes. This insistence on being allowed to return to their homes should be viewed in the context of the disconcerting rumour that the IDPs may  be settled in different places and their developed land would be given to others.
The government should take action to dispel this widespread fear among the Tamils that the IDPs would be deprived of their lands.
As I pointed out in my earlier columns, land had been a subject of dispute between the Tamils and the Sinhalese. State aided colonisation in the east and in the border areas may be interpreted as one of the causes of the ethnic conflict.
 Establishment of National Land and Water Commission is one of the recommendations of the APRC handed over to President Mahinda Rajapaksa a few weeks ago. APRC recommendations include Pruning of Executive Presidential Powers, reverting to the Westminster System and the establishment of a Second Chamber of Parliament.
Tamil and Muslim parties which looked at the Executive Presidency as one of their safeguards have begun to alter their stand following the recent elections. The minority parties supported the executive presidential form of government in the belief that in a Sinhala community vertically divided between the SLFP and the UNP votes of the minority communities would be the deciding factor. They felt that in such a situation the minorities could help elect a minority friendly candidate as president within a minority proactive coalition.
War victory
War victory has changed the situation. As the results of the recent Provincial Council election have shown Sinhalese voters have got together and backed President Rajapaksa and the UPFA. If that trend continues, and the government expects that it would, the Sinhalese people would give President Rajapaksa and the UPFA the two-third majority.
In such a circumstance the minority communities would lose the clout they enjoyed under the Executive Presidential system. The experience of the Eastern Provincial Council has shown the Executive President can catalyse the running the provincial administration through the governor and by implementing the national policies.
Speaking at a seminar held in Colombo last week SLMC deputy general secretary Nizam Kariappar said, “We have found that executive presidential system impedes the functioning of provincial administration. Let’s abolish it.”
Sri Kantha of the TNA concurred with Kariappar’s view. He said, “No programme of devolution is going to work with the executive presidency.”
The new developments may influence the thinking of the Tamil and Muslim people and affect their future course of actions. It has begun to affect the SLMC where opinion about joining the UNP-led coalition is being hotly debated. They are bound to affect the political parties and groups aligned to the government.
The thinking that the Tamils and Muslims can extract concessions but not anything beyond is growing among the Tamil and Muslim people. They ask: From the time of G.G. Ponnambalam Tamils and Muslims have worked with UNP and SLFP led governments. Have they won for their people their basic needs?