{"id":85225,"date":"2019-01-31T11:06:47","date_gmt":"2019-01-31T18:06:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=85225"},"modified":"2019-01-31T11:06:47","modified_gmt":"2019-01-31T18:06:47","slug":"do-away-with-pcs13th-a-and-presidency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/01\/31\/do-away-with-pcs13th-a-and-presidency\/","title":{"rendered":"Do away with PCs,13th A and Presidency"},"content":{"rendered":"

N.A.de S. Amaratunga<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

Several Provinces have existed without their Councils with no breakdown of essential services to the people for more than one year due to elections not being held. Though it is argued that not holding elections on time is a denial of democratic rights not holding elections for redundant institutions which in fact are a white elephant and a burden on the tax paying poor people could be considered a blessing in disguise. PCs were created as a solution to the so called ethnic Tamil problem but the silence of Tamil politicians on the issue of delay in elections to the Northern PC is deafening to say the least. If they can do without their PC there cannot be an ethnic problem of enormous magnitude which necessitated a protracted war of 30 years and the introduction by force of the 13th A by India. People of this country did not ask for the 13th A, it was forced on us by a hegemonic imperialist India partly to pacify Tamil Nadu politicians, and to prevent other interested global powers getting into the fray for geopolitical reasons. Our poor people have to pay for global geopolitical vagaries and local communal dubious ‘aspirations’.<\/p>\n

There have been several letters in these columns asking for a clarification of the issue known by several names such as Ethnic problem, Tamil Problem, Language Problem, National problem so on and so forth. But an answer in clear terms that ordinary people understand has not emanated from those who wag eloquence on the subject. This problem could be traced back to the times before independence when Tamil leaders petitioned the British government calling for a separate Tamil state on the basis that a Tamil state existed before foreign invaders conquered the country. The fact that the Tamil state they refer to was an occupation by South Indian invaders can easily be proved but due to space constraints it could be postponed to a future occasion. The Tamil problem from that unholy beginning had evolved through several stages such as the demand for a 50% representation in the State Council for minorities, demand for federalism, anti-Sinhala demonstrations in 1956, Vadukodai Declaration in 1976 and the LTTE war for the creation of Eelam. There had always been foreign involvement and support for the so called Tamil cause and at present it is spearheaded by Britain mainly due to the political clout and vote base of the Tamil Diaspora with the British political parties vying with each other to please the diaspora to get their votes. The USA, Europe and other western countries and also the regional power India are involved due to geopolitical reasons. Thus the issue is not one that originates from the people of the country but one that has been created by minority politicians with the instigation, support and sponsorship of interested foreign powers. At present the Tamil politicians sans the LTTE seem to have reverted back to lobbying the foreign powers quite successfully with the willing support of local opportunist politicians to pursue their separatist agenda.<\/p>\n

The Provincial Councils do not serve any useful purpose. Instead it is another bureaucratic barrier to the people that increase the red tape, inconvenience, waste of time, money and energy of the people. Further it has increased the number of corrupt politicians that people have to bribe to get any official work done. The devolution of power via these PCs is totally redundant as shown by the inability of the Northern PC, which was formed for the very purpose of solving the Tamil problem, to make use of the opportunity to serve the people. The work done by these PCs could easily be carried out by the GA and the kachcheri system we had previously without the involvement of politicians. Similarly administrative power could be devolved to the North through the local government institutions. The 13th<\/sup> A with its Land and Police powers hangs over us like a Sword of Damocles which could eventually pave the way for a separate state. Thus the 13th<\/sup> A and its offspring the provincial councils could be done away with bringing great benefit to the people including Tamils.<\/p>\n

One of the main campaign slogans of he incumbent president, though he may now have changed his mind, was the abolition of the presidency. One of his main supporters the late Ven Sobitha was adamant that the presidency was inimical to the country and monstrous in its concentration of power in one office. However, those who vie for the preservation of the presidency argue that a president elected by the entire country and representing their sovereignty must have control over the provincial councils if centrifugal separatist forces which abound in Sri Lanka are to be thwarted. Yet the presidential powers relevant to this aspect of the problem become non-essential if the 13th<\/sup> A with police and land powers and the PCs are abolished. Executive powers then could repose in the cabinet of ministers. This would also reduce the political institutions and the expense of electing and maintaining them which may be too heavy for a poor country. JRJ created a monster when there was no need as there were no PCs then. 13th<\/sup> A added to the monstrosity. It is time to get rid of all these monsters and install a simple inexpensive system of governance consisting of incorruptible, honest, patriotic people.<\/p>\n

One may ask what about the Tamil problem. Firstly this has not been clearly explained. As far as any fair minded person could see Tamils in Sri Lanka are better off than Tamils in India. In Tamil Nadu for instance, Tamils cannot represent a case in courts in the Tamil language, leave alone anywhere else in India, where as Tamils in Sri Lanka could do so anywhere in the country. Tamils in the North and the East have no issues that other communities do not have regarding the use of language, education, employment, economy, household income, culture, sports etc. The house hold income in Vavuniya is better than that in Kandy, so are the roads. They have excelled in education. They have no special problems that arise due to their ethnicity. If Tamils are\u00a0 discriminated they would not be able to achieve what they have. As for their political rights, these could easily be addressed at the centre of political power instead of at the periphery as the country is very small. Tamil representation at the centre should be made more meaningful particularly on matters related to minorities. The money saved by the removal of the presidency, PCs and 13th<\/sup> A\u00a0 could be used for the benefit of everybody. Tamils and other minorities should be made to develop a sense of belonging in the country of their berth. A federal state is not necessary for this, in fact a federal state based on ethnicity would result in the hardening of ethnic identity and lead to a tendency for secession.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

N.A.de S. Amaratunga Several Provinces have existed without their Councils with no breakdown of essential services to the people for more than one year due to elections not being held. Though it is argued that not holding elections on time is a denial of democratic rights not holding elections for redundant institutions which in fact […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[127],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-85225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-n-a-de-s-amaratunga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85225","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=85225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85225\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}