Devolution deal: too little for Tamils, too much for Sinhalese

By Nirupama Subramanian

COLOMBO, JULY 16. A bleak future seems to be ahead for the People's Alliance (PA)-United National Party (UNP) agreement on devolution with the Tamils calling it a denial of their rights and Sinhalese extremists dubbing it a sellout to the minorities.

All the Tamil parties have rejected the agreement as too little, too late. The three main parties, the Tamil United Liberation Front, the Eelam People's Democratic Party and the People's Liberation Organisation of Tamils that represent northeast Sri Lanka in Parliament, have said the draft document was ``unacceptable'' because it denies the merger of northeastern Sri Lanka and vests control of state land with the Centre.

According to them, it also fails to clearly specify that Sri Lanka is not a unitary state.

On top of that, seven other Tamil parties including the Ceylon Workers' Congress, the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation and the Eelam People's Revolutionary Liberation Front issued a joint statement on Saturday describing the agreement as a ``sinister design''.

``The fact that this agreement, contrary to (our) basic stand that our homeland consisting of the northeast province is indivisible under any political settlement of the ethnic conflict, contains a proposal to hold a referendum in the eastern province to shatter the territorial unity of our homeland and (ensures) that the Sri Lankan state would not shed its unitary character, makes it crystal clear that this agreement cannot in any way contribute to the resolution of the national question,'' the joint statement declared.

It pointed out that the provision enabling the Central Government to intervene in the regions through emergency powers was ``totally contrary'' to the concept of autonomy of regions. The parties demanded that the Government stop the war and initiate negotiations with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

On the other hand, Sinhalese extremists are baying against the PA and the UNP for giving away too much to the Tamil minority. Recalling the `little now, more later' policy of the late Tamil leader, S.J. Chelvanayakam, the hardline outfit, Sihala Urumaya, asked in a statement: ``If regional councils are now established, can anybody of sound mind and reasonable intelligence fail to realise that those regional councils will be the `little now' and a separate state of Tamil Eelam the `more later', and not very much later at that?''

The Sihala Urumaya general secretary, Mr. Nihal Karunaratne, slammed both the President, Ms. Chandrika Kumaratunga, and the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe, for not consulting the Buddhist clergy of the country on the agreed proposals.

``Why is it that the end result of the conspiracy between the PA and UNP to abdicate the powers of Parliament and divide this country is being communicated only to racist Tamil parties and not to any other party or segment of the populace including the Maha Sangha to which both these parties are ever ready to pay homage in front of cameras,'' Mr. Karunaratne wondered.

It was evident that ``new-found partnership'' between the President and the Leader of the Opposition was a plan to keep the draft document a secret and ``foist'' it as a fait accompli on the people, Mr. Karunaratne fumed.

Summing up the political noise that the agreement has created, the Sunday Times said different political players in the exercise had widely varying expectations from it.

``The hurried consultations that the President has had with the leaders of Tamil parties indicate that she is in a desperate hurry to show the Tamil constituency that she is making certain `concessions' on their behalf. Ranil Wickremesinghe, on the other hand, lives in the hope that the combined forces of the Tamil parties and Sinhala interests spearheaded by the Maha Sangha will cancel each other out, bringing the whole political exercise concerning the package to a halt,'' the newspaper said in an editorial today.

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