Powers appeasing SL State risk future instability in the island: Gajendrakumar
[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 September 2018, 22:12 GMT] The Tamil people value the sacrifices made by their liberation movement with the highest respect. However, the SL State and its military show relentless intolerance against every attempt by the Tamils in the North-East to honour the sites of their destroyed monuments. The attitude is counter-productive, not only to the SL State but also to the global actors, who continue to appease the SL government, which refuses to reform itself, alluded Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, the leader of Tamil National Peoples' Front, in a recent interview to TamilNet. His comments come after witnessing the hostile acts of the SL military and the SL CID during the annual festival of Nalloor temple in Jaffna this month against the move to preserve the sacred nature of the memorial square of Lt. Col. Thileepan, who sacrificed himself in a fast-unto-death campaign in 1987.
The members of the international community would do best by refraining from supporting such activities of the SL government, the TNPF leader said, while concluding the interview.
Mr Gajendrakumar's observations come at a time when Tamils, particularly the younger generation of the people, are getting increasingly annoyed and irked by the acts of Sinhala Theravada Buddhist Establishment, various SL departments and the Mahaweli Authority, grabbing lands and sites of Tamil heritage drawing sharp protests in the recent days. The Tamil people are also witnessing military-to-military engagements taking place between the foreign powers and the military of genocidal Sri Lanka in their occupied homeland.
In his interview, the TNPF leader observed that the Tamils had displayed restraint and tolerance so far. They have not objected the sentiments of the Sinhala people to have monuments in remembrance of the fallen Sinhala soldiers in the South, he said.
However, what the SL State and its military have done in the North-East, has been thoroughly running against the sentiments of the Tamils, he said.
The SL military intelligence and the CID of the SL Police were blocking the workers of the elected Municipal Council to put up a fence and preserve the sacrification site of Lt. Col. Thileepan at Nalloor as a sacred place. They were also harassing the TNPF members who were acting with permission from the Municipal Council.
The SL Governor in the North and the SL Military Commander were canvassing to retake the Jaffna Fort into the military fold with the agenda of annexing the Sinhala Maha Vidyalaya with it, Mr Gajendrakumar observed.
The victory-centric status quo being imposed by the SL State was having a dimension of an insecure mindset, he observed.
“The SL State and the consecutive governments are so insecure that they feel that they have to build these walls around them. That is the only way that they can remain safe in what is essentially an alien territory. They are conquerors. They are not liked [by the people]. They have failed in the hearts-and-minds approach,” Gajendrakumar said.
The SL State, built on a false premise, was not prepared to reform itself. Moreover, it doesn't understand the plurinational and multi-national character of the island, he said.
“This sort of insecurity, under which this Sinhala Buddhist nationalist ethnocratic Sri Lankan State we see operating today, is not sustainable and it is something the State will have to learn very quickly, but unfortunately in the most unnecessary and bitter way.”
For future stability, the SL State should learn to respect the existence of the Tamil nation as much as there is the Sinhala nation in the South. Both the nations have their respective glorious pasts, he said.
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