Election begins to solidify government control in the East
March 21st, 2008
The overwhelming success of the Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP), a breakaway faction of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), in the 10 March local government elections in the eastern Batticaloa District has prompted the group, backed by the Sri Lankan government, to seek additional victories at provincial level.
Sivasuntharai Chandrakanthan, alias Pillayan, the TMVP leader
The TMVP won majorities in all nine areas up for election and secured 76 of the 101 seats on offer with its coalition partner, the United People’s Freedom Alliance, which holds power in parliament.
“These are very small councils, the power is very small,” Azad Moulana, the party spokesperson said. “This is the first step; we can do more in the provincial councils.”
Two days after the election, the government announced that elections for the Eastern Provincial Council, which includes the districts of Batticaloa, Trincomalee and Amapara in eastern Sri Lanka, would be held on 10 May.
“It [the 10 March election] demonstrated the shape of events to come … the success of the election has paved the way for provincial council elections in May,” Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama said.
The poll was held 10 months after the Sri Lankan government gained control of all areas formerly held by the LTTE in Batticaloa District, including Ichchanthivu, an interior village west of the town.
The legitimacy of the election, however, has been disputed, with two of the largest opposition parties, the United National Party (UNP) and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) boycotting it.
Their absence paved the way for the TMVP landslide. The TMVP has been accused by the UN and other agencies of child recruitment, abductions and other violations.
Election monitors, the People’s Action for Free and Fair Election (PAFFREL), stated that despite no violence nor incidents of rigging being reported on polling day, there was a lot of pressure on candidates opposed to the TMVP to not stand.
[Women wade through pools of water to reach the polling station in Ichchanthivu recently-Photo: Amantha Perera/IRIN]
“The entire course of the election, from the time of its announcement, was free of overt violence,” it said in its interim report on the poll. “However, during this period PAFFREL received several reports of intimidation of candidates, which is not acceptable in a democratic process.”
Safety fears
The TMVP, a formerly outright militant group, remains heavily armed, although it has ostensibly entered mainstream politics. On the eve of the election, IRIN witnessed at least a dozen young men bearing T56 machine guns inside the TMVP compound on Lake Drive in Batticaloa town.
“We will disarm once we enter democratic politics,” Sivasuntharai Chandrakanthan, alias Pillayan, the head of the TMVP, said soon after casting his vote.
The presence of armed TMVP cadres proved unnerving to most civilians, despite the peaceful ballot. “We want reassurances that we will not be harmed, that we can live in peace,” said Vellappaddi Sellamma, 56, from Ichchanthivu village in Batticaloa district, 300km from Colombo, the capital. “We want our children to live without fear.”
Sellamma could not remember the last time she cast a vote to elect a public official and like many others was excited to exercise her newly gained franchise. It was the first time in 14 years that she or neighbours had the opportunity to cast their votes.
But even given their enthusiasm for the voting process, few held high hopes that the elected officials would bring much change. “They will not do much …all this will be quickly forgotten,” Irasamani Thangaraja from the same village said. “We don’t want to hope and be disappointed.”
But the government thinks otherwise. Soon after the election, it hailed the vote as an endorsement of its policies in the east.
“They [Batticaloa voters] have shown the world that they want to defeat separatism,” government media minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa told the media in Colombo on 11 March. “The government has commenced a giant development drive in the east. Under the Eastern Resurgence Programme, schools, roads, bridges, hospitals and all other facilities will be provided.”
After more than two decades of fighting between government forces and the Tigers, the district has suffered immensely, especially areas such as Ichchanthivu that were under LTTE rule for about 12 years until the Tamil Tigers were swept out by government security forces.
Between 2007 and 2008, some 100,000 people who were displaced have been resettled in the district, according to the Ministry of Resettlement and Disaster Relief Services, Rishad Badiudeen, while another 18,000 will be resettled shortly.
Related: Sri Lanka’s Wild East Plans First Vote in Over 10 Years [NY Times]
Entry Filed under: MinorMatters, irin
8 Comments Add your own
1. samuel | March 21st, 2008 at 9:20 am
Voting for a party which has access to arms with tacit permission for same by the state is “voting” under coercion, even if same was without “incidents”.
This situation prevented independents from contesting.
This was a SHAM ELECTION.
2. M.thiru | March 21st, 2008 at 11:54 am
Are the leaders of JVP,JHU, TULF, TMVP,EPDP, SLMC, mrs Ashraf’s party,UNP,SLFP change their party names ?
What are their manifesto on land, demograhpy,language, religion, jobs, development and thing like that in the eastern province before May elections ?
Do the Tamils and Muslims parties of eastern province agree with Bernard Goonatilke the representative of GOSL in USA that Tamil speaking people do not have traditional home land in neither Eastern province nor most of the nothern province ?
If they are agreeing with the GOSL stand there is no traditional homeland for Tamil speaking people, then people like Sangaree, Devanda, Pillayan, Mrs Ashraf, Sitharthan must openly tell the public that they accept the GOSL stand that there is no traditional homeland concept and they will change their party names or will merge with JVP and JHU in coming out witha common manifesto or overlapping manifesto ?
3. Nam | March 21st, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Overwhelming success? What is that mean. Do we have a different dictionary or the unnamed and unknwon author was sarcastic in his writing.
Why can’t this people write fictions put their name rather than hide behind smoke screen.
I am being a regular reader of this web site start seeing the Journalist ethic change with articles start appearing without an author or a pen name.
4. Sri | March 22nd, 2008 at 1:33 am
This is good news!. So there is going to be elections to the Eastern Provincial Council for the first time!.
Earlier elections were held for the merged North East Provincial Council in 1988 during the IPKF period.
But all members in all the districts in the Northern Province were elected uncontested thanks to IPKF and LTTE.
But elections were contested in the Eastern Province and the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress contested an election for the first time despite the presence of armed IPKF and LTTE.
SLMC had never boycotted any elections in their brief history whereas SLFP,JVP and TULF/TNA had boycotted with disastrous consequences for the respective party as well as for the constituents they represented.
SLMC took risks and rewarded and TNA by their negative polices are becoming more and more irrelevant.
We have to stop this nonsense!
The Tamils/TNA should not repeat the mistake they did earlier in1987 by refraining from contesting elections to the NEPC on flimsy excuses.
Had they contested in 1987, they could have created history and captured the North East Provincial Council and negotiated more power with the Indian support including on police and land matters and also brought the district and divisional administration under the control of the Provincial Council and they could have maneuvered with the Muslims and the Sinhalese in the East to keep the North East merged.
There is no need for an ethnically homogenous north, east or northeast!
Armed struggle if not skillfully used will be counter productive whereas diplomacy and foresight will bring better results at least cost.
Self pity and always putting the blame on others and expecting others to come to your rescue are all negative approaches .Let others have their agenda!
Be brave and be positive and act .
There is a way out!
. The elections to the Eastern Province is an opportunity that should not be missed.
A grand alliance of Tamils, Muslims and Sinhalese living in the Eastern Province under a common programme is the necessity of the day. I
f you are imaginative it is possible to accommodate the grievances and aspirations of all the three communities as far as possible and make all three communities the stakeholders in this exercise.
Power sharing is the answer!
Let us be not always part of the problem!. Let us be partners in the solution!
5. Subra S.Massey | March 22nd, 2008 at 10:05 am
Gentlemen,
Paramilitary has become the law makers of the country!.
What are they going to legislate? Rape. Murder, Extortions, armed robbery etc. Give us a break please.
You know the people of the east deserve such a government. They don’t know what freedom is, may be to them next meal could be the freedom. Some people think we can live any which way the wind blows, but some people hraness the same wind for sustainable freedom. It is their choice they will live it up or down. That is democracy.
6. 2ndClassTamil | March 22nd, 2008 at 5:25 pm
So, the claim is that Tamil nationalism in the east is dead. The world knows it appears so, helpless under the threat of the gun. It will end its hibernation and erupt in the not too distant future once the guns are neutralised.
7. Devinda Fernando | March 24th, 2008 at 10:15 pm
2nd Class Idiot and Subra Massey.
Stop your Barking. This situation could have been the LTTE’s for the taking 20 years ago. The People will vote, and they will vote for the TMVP, and the will vote for SLMC, and some may even vote for the SLFP and the UNP and the JHU and the JVP, but they will Not vote for the LTTE and the TNA Sock puppets they control.
It will be the Will of the people heard in this election, NOT the Will of the Deluded Donkey Diaspora this time round. The people of the East have had enough of fighting for the Unobtainable, Racist, and Communalistic ideals of Bitter, Resentful, Tamils hiding in Western Countries.
Look how you complain that a Paramilitary group enters the Political Mainstream… ? isn’t that the whole point? Face it, you love the LTTE and you sport a Chubby in your pants for Prabharkaran. You say these people DONT know what freedom is??? What was freedom before this?
Forced Conscription? Taxation without Representation? Perpetual Warfare? Lack of ability to Dissent? How perverse is your thinking that you wouold say that all these things are better for the Tamil people than what is happening now? You people make me sick the way you advocate these things in the name of a Freedom Struggle. Face it the East will never go back to the LTTE.. And not so long ago you shouted “Genocide” and it never happened, because it was never true,… Now sit alone in you room and wonder why you got it so wrong, …for so long.
;)
8. nandasena | March 28th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
What freedom has people got under the present Sl Govt.? Abduction, killing,rape,torture,murder,ransom demanding, made to dissappear!! Abducting MPs and their relatives, so that they cannot vote against the government. Arrest without warrant. Arrested people dissappearing! Killing political opponents. people being held in jails without charges for ages. Only fault of theirs in that they speak Tamil.
Some commentators pretend that these things does not exist under the Sinhalese Govt. Does’nt the govt. does forced conscription through TMVP?
Sl Govt. is getting all the dirty works done by the paramilitaries . They are just doing all these for the crumbs. When they realise their follies, it will be too late!! These paramilitaries would be discarded once their usefulness become redundant.
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