The LTTE leader’s speech on Heroes’ Day may be considered a shrewd analysis of the politics of the south.
He has detailed in it the differences his organization had had with the UNP Government. The speech also contained an analysis of the President’s activities and of the UPFA Government.
According to Prabhakaran, the committees set up for resettlement and rehabilitation of the displaced in the north and for restoration of buildings destroyed by war have failed to perform any useful task. In spite of that, the UNP Government, by participation in the aid conference in Washington, denied the LTTE its position as an equal part- ner. Consequently the discussions had to be suspended. It was thereafter that the UNP government put forward proposals for an interim administration. None of the drafts submitted was acceptable. The LTTE put forward a series of proposals for the purpose.
At a time when the UNP Government had expressed its willingness to start negotiations on the basis of those proposals, the President took over three of the ministries and, sending the government into a crisis, dissolved the parliament. The President was able to win the election that followed by joining hands with JVP forces. Prabhakaran called the new UPFA Government an alliance of political parties with contradictory views.
Prabhakaran accuses the Alliance Government of lack- ing a firm and single policy on the ethnic crisis. He feels that the JVP party is “radically opposed to giving the Tamil people their political rights and administration powers”. He states that the Alliance Government is unable to start peace talks and says that if the Alliance Government wants to begin peace talks, they must be started on the basis of the LTTE’s proposals for an Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA), which it has put forward. He also says that, if there are any elements in their proposals to which the government cannot agree, they too can be discussed. On the attempt to combine the proposal for an ISGA with a final solution, he says that probably the President wants to or perhaps to prolong the discussions endlessly. please the JVP, or to mislead the international community.
Prabhakaran is opposed to tying the proposal for an ISGA with that for a final solution. He says that after an ISGA administrative structure is set up, and after it has start- ed functioning soundly, it will be possible to start discus- sions a
At the end of his speech he also posed a serious chal- lenge to the political parties of the south. He has asked all the political parties to declare in public their stand on the Victor Ivan is the Editor of the Ravaya newspaper ethnic crisis, namely fundamental demands of the Tamils the national territory, nationality and right to self-determination.
He says that, if the political parties of the south do not have a clear idea about the political aspirations of the Tamils, then there is no meaning in talking to those parties.
What he finally says is that the Tamil people are unwilling to live a life in which the Tamil nation is tied down to a Sinhala land, and that they are also unwilling to separate and live alone, and that it is not their wish to live with no positive status and without liberation.
He says that it will not be pos- sible to live continuously in political darkness and that there is a limit to the patience and the expectations of the Tamil people, and he requests the Government of Sri Lanka to start discussions immediately on the proposals that the LTTE has submitted. He also says that, if the government refuses to accept that request of the LTTE, they will have no option but to proceed with the liberation struggle again.
In this speech by Prabhakaran he appears to have at- tempted to state his views honestly and clearly. He also seems to express his ideas with a lucid understanding of the narrow and selfish nature of the politics of the south.
Now the ball is not in the court of the Tamils but in that of the Sinhalese.
The Sinhala leaders of the south do not consider the ethnic problem as one that should be ended by all means at their disposal. Every leader tries to turn it into a part of his/her own personal political agenda.
Although Mr Ranii Wickremesinghe has expressed a more advanced approach, even his program contained a selfish approach centering on himself. It seemed that he wanted to see that the discussions dragged on until his own becoming the President and to ensure Tamil support for his presidential campaign. To the President too, the problem of preventing her own invalidation has become more important than the ethnic problem. Her intention appears to be to turn the ethnic problem into a part of the problem of her own invalidation.
It is not possible for the President to tame the JVP and to enter into negotiations with Prabhakaran. On the other hand, it is also not possible for her to abandon the JVP and to go forward with the UNP. What will finally happen is that she will forget about the entire problem of the north and will pursue the program of preventing her own invalidation.
The UNP too will have to forget everything else to pay for the selfishness of them all. In fact the Sinhala people will come to detest all their leaders and might even be pushed to a position of saying ‘Prabhakaran is good for us too.