Premachandran denounces clandestine TNA deal with NDF

[TamilNet, Thursday, 11 December 2014, 18:15 GMT]
The basic strength of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) led by the incumbent Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa, and the National Democratic Front (NDF) led by the Common Opposition Presidential candidate Mr Maithiripala Sirisena, has been solely depending on the Sinhala communal mindset South in the upcoming presidential election and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) cannot enter into an agreement with any of them, said the TNA media spokesman and Jaffna district TNA parliamentarian Suresh Premachchandran on Thursday. However, responding to Premachchandran, NDF's Maithiripala Sirisena said ‘individual politicians’ could make ‘different’ statements.

Mr Suresh Premachchandran was addressing media persons in reply to a statement made by Mr Tissa Attanayake who crossed over to the ruling UPFA after resigning the post of the main opposition United National Party (UNP) that the common opposition candidate and the TNA had a secret agreement over the upcoming presidential election.

Both the ruling UPFA and common opposition led NDF do not speak about the needs of the masses in their press briefings. But, both the groups purely depend on racism against Tamils to keep their Sinhala votes intact, Mr Premachandran said.

Speeches made by the leaders of the groups spread stories about Tigers and the Tamil diaspora to beef up their vote banks among the Sinhalese, he said adding: “We have not had any talks with these presidential groups. Tamil people should not believe in such false stories. There is no truth in such stories which are spread to deceive the Sinhalese people,” he said.

However, responding to Premachchandran, NDF's Maithiripala Sirisena said ‘individual politicians’ could make ‘different’ statements.

Addressing the heads of print and electronic media said he had met some members of the TNA. But, there was no agreement reached with them, the common presidential candidate said.

“We signed only one agreement in open at Viharamahadevi Park. The TNA could come forward to support it based on the points of the open Viharamahadevi Park agreement,” Sirisena further commented.

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