RANJITH SOYSA

Of late, some of the members of Sinhala community are receiving step motherly treatment from the racist Tamil politicians as well as the local administrations and in some instances from the  Police services too. The discriminatory policies impacting Sinhala villagers in Kokkilai bay area and Divulapthana in the East are being discussed regularly in the social media but unfortunately have failed to attract the attention of the main print and electronic media.

The Sinhala villagers living in Kokklai bay area having settled in these locations after the racial disturbances about 70 years ago still are not recognized by the local administration as some of them do not have the right to vote and many of them are living in lands with temporary permits even though they have fulfilled the conditions of permanent residency in the districts, The racist politicians have been interfering and influencing the district administrations to continue the unfortunate situation in which the Sinhala villagers are treated differently to all others living in the area. It is indeed unfair to refuse to provide them with basic human rights when the Government is bending over backwards to claim ownership of the concept of reconciliation.

Similarly, some of the Sinhala villages, in the East are targeted by the big business minded and racist Tamil politicians in the attempts to drive away the peasant Sinhala settlers who have been again living in these area for more than 70 years after they were at the receiving end of LTTE terror groups and having forced to leave their traditional villages. Suddenly, the regional administration under the cover of clearing Mahaveli land area began to engage in a process of ethnic cleansing by opening the agricultural plots of the farmers for thousands of cattle. While vast land area is developed by big land owners of Tamil origin they are compelling the Sinhala small landowners to handover their small plots to the cattle! The village, Digampthana is a classic example in which villagers are fighting for their very existence.

We have noted that the President and his political followers are attempting to strike a deal with Tamil expatriates with the expectation of investment capital and their obvious preference at this stage is not the basic HR of the poor Sinhala villagers in the North and the East. BUT we warn the Government that their policy of appeasement of the racist Tamil politics at the expense of basic HR of the beleaguered Sinhala poor people is to break out of bounds.

RANJITH SOYSA