{"id":106893,"date":"2020-09-22T15:49:37","date_gmt":"2020-09-22T22:49:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=106893"},"modified":"2020-09-22T15:49:37","modified_gmt":"2020-09-22T22:49:37","slug":"dual-citizens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/09\/22\/dual-citizens\/","title":{"rendered":"Dual Citizens"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chanaka Bandarage<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

With the\nadvent of 20A bashing the dual citizens has become a pastime of many. It has\nnow become a fashionable social phenomena.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently\ndual citizens are seen as a \u2018pariah community\u2019. \nThey are attacked from left, centre and the right. They are despised in\nevery corner. They are seen as the reason for every evil of the land.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we\nrefer to Sri Lankan dual citizens we largely mean the very large Sinhalese\ncommunity who have taken up citizenship in developed western countries like the\nUSA, Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Germany, Switzerland  and France. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These\npeople tend to work to preserve the unitary status of  Sri Lanka. Though they have left the\nmotherland permanently, they are genuine patriots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some have\nreturned to the motherland and contribute to the development of Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

True\nthere are a large number of Tamil dual citizens, but, they are more or less\nreferred to as the Tamil Diaspora. There is a perception that some of them support\nthe creation of the separate Tamil Eelam in Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over a\nmillion Sinhalese dual citizens live in those western countries.  Most of them left Sri Lanka during the war period.\n In 1980s to early 2000s hundreds and thousands\nof educated Sinhalese left Sri Lanka to western countries to escape the war,\nand also in search of greener pastures. \nThe majority of them settled down well in their newly adopted countries.\nThey have led exemplary, decent lives. They have mingled well with their respective\nwestern counterparts. They have brought forth much fame and glory to Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A significant\nfeature of them is that they have continued to maintain a close tie with the\nmotherland. Since leaving, most of them have visited the mother country often\nas possible.  They send millions (perhaps\nbillions) of valuable foreign remittance to Sri Lanka. They help their kith and\nkin in Sri Lanka in numerous ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During\nthe war, the Sinhalese dual citizens  fought vehemently hard against the LTTE and\ntheir sympathizers operating in the west. They united themselves as a force. To\nbestow goodwill to Sri Lanka they conducted Bodhi Pujas in the temples that\nthey have built in their adopted countries. Christians have also done similar\nthings, though to a lesser degree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is\nalso thanks to their struggles that the LTTE was able to be banned easily in\nthose countries.  These good people did\nmany things like positive lobbying, conducting demonstrations for Sri Lanka and\ndirectly confronting Tamil Tigers and their Sri Lankan and western supporters\nwho are extremely strong and powerful in those countries. Dual citizens have\nfought hard to stop western nations from imposing various sanctions and\nrestrictions against Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The meritorious\nand righteous things that these dual citizens have done for Sri Lanka is many.\nThe only \u2018sin\u2019 that they have committed is leaving mother Lanka during the time\nof the war and acquiring a second citizenship. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As stated\nin the beginning, there is a strong resentment in the country today against dual\ncitizens.  This is because 20A attempts\nto lift the ban on them from entering the parliament. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Majority\nof the people oppose this stand. They correctly argue that dual citizens should\nnot be allowed to enter the parliament. It is a justified demand. Dual citizens\nshow allegiance to two nations \u2013 Sri Lanka and their newly adopted\ncountry.  Such people should not be\nallowed to enter the parliament. If they want, they must renounce their second citizenship\nfirst (the biggest joke is that there are a number of dual citizenship holders\nin the current parliament; it is rumored that several of TNA MPs hold dual\ncitizenships.  Only Geetha Kumarasinhge\nwas chased out of the parliament owing to be a dual citizen, and Gotabaya was\ncompelled to renounce his US citizenship before contesting the Sri Lankan\nPresidential election 2019).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is\na demand that dual citizens should be stopped from holding any high level\ngovernment position. This is not fair and reasonable. It is in the government\u2019s\ninterests that such qualified and highly experienced persons are offered top\npositions in the government\u2019s administrative and management hierarchy. It is\nthe creation of a \u2018Win Win\u2019 situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clearly dual\ncitizens are not enemies of the nation. As pointed out herein, they are genuine\nfriends of the motherland (true patriots). Some say they love the motherland\nmore than those who actually live there. As indicated earlier dual citizens\nhave contributed immensely in the social, cultural and economic development and\nwellbeing of Sri Lanka in numerous ways. A separate book can be written about\nthis! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ncountry should be kind to the dual citizens. They should not be attacked at\nevery nook and corner like now. The writer states that those who attack them\nseem to be doing so with a cynical mindset. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some say if dual citizens are allowed to enter the parliament,\nsuch dubious characters like ex Tamil Tigers and their sympathizers, members of\nthe Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam<\/em>\nwould also enter it. This is a ridiculous argument. This cannot happen in any\nway. Some of these people have committed serious crimes against Sri Lanka and\nher people. We have existing laws to punish them for their crimes. So, instead\nof entering the parliament such criminals when arrive in the country should be presented\nwith a charge sheet. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chanaka Bandarage With the advent of 20A bashing the dual citizens has become a pastime of many. It has now become a fashionable social phenomena. Currently dual citizens are seen as a \u2018pariah community\u2019.  They are attacked from left, centre and the right. They are despised in every corner. They are seen as the reason […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[88],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chanaka-bandarage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106893"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106893\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}