'OUR TAMILS' AND OTHER TAMILS

By N Sathya Moorthy www.dailymirror.lk

If the killing of Sri Lankan Minister Jeyaraj Fernandopulle brings to mind memories about the assassination of Lakshman Kadirgamar, it's not without reason. Though the comparison may end there, given the different capabilities they possessed and the different roles that they had played while around, the two were possibly the last of the contemporary Tamils who became acceptable as leaders in their own right in and to the majority Sinhala polity in native Sri Lanka.

Both Kadirgamar and Fernandopulle made their names in the one-time 'Sinhala hard line' SLFP, that too when the party was in power. Long before Kadirgamar, you had the likes of Alfred Duraiappah, in turn the Tamil-speaking SLFP Mayor of Jaffna. It was his cold-blooded killing for being what he was that among others triggered the spiral of violence, and culminated in the ethnic war – both of which have continued for three-plus decades now.

Fernandopulle was the fifth Tamil member of the 225-member Sri Lankan Parliament to have been killed in just over two years. If Joseph Pararajasingam of the TNA fell victim at a 'Christmas Mass' killing in a Batticaloa church in 2005, UNP's Maheshwaran was similarly shot dead at the Ponnambalavaneswarar Kovil (temple) in Colombo on the morning of New Year Day this year. Natarajah Raviraj, also of the TNA, died on a Colombo road not far away from the Military Police Headquarters in November 2006 while more recently K. Sivanesan, his party colleague, was killed in a claymore mine blast inside LTTE's Kilinochchi heartland.

Fernandopulle had tested and tasted Fate not very long ago. He was believed to have been the real target when another Minister D.M. Dassanayake died in a blast in the Colombo suburb of Ja Ela while proceeding to Parliament only days after Maheswaran's killing in January. Considering that marathon runner K.A. Karunaratne and national athletics coach Lakshman de Alwis too died in the blast at Weliweriya along with Fernandopulle, the International Federation of Athletics Associations was right in condemning the dastardly attack that targeted a community athletic effort of the nature, to welcome the Sinhala and Tamil New Years.

Fernandopulle was one of the few members of Parliament in a Sinhala majority party able to converse in all three languages – Tamil, Sinhalese and English. Maybe it was all aimed at 'minority appeasement' of a rare variety, but the fact remained Fernandopulle was not only the Minister for Roads and Highways Development, a crucial portfolio in the Sri Lankan context, but was also the Chief Whip of the ruling combine in Parliament. Of equal significance was his role as the Treasurer of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), of which President Mahinda Rajapaksa is the supremo. You can't call them all crumbs.

Through all this Fernandopulle was in a rare position, which no other Tamil leader barring Lakshman Kadirgamar had enjoyed in recent times, it was not to be. Rather than putting such access of a Tamil leader to good use for the larger benefit of the community, his militant detractors have since removed him from the scene. It was also the case with Kadirgmar. It is now doubtful if yet another Tamil leader would come to play a dominant role in the majority Sinhala polity in the near future. Tamil Ministers, there are many, but ruling party treasurer's post, it is doubtful if any Tamil leader would come to occupy in either of the 'Sinhala majors', namely the SLFP and the UNP. Even then, it would be next to impossible for a Tamil to become the Chief Government Whip in Parliament in the near future.

It was no different in the case of Pararajasingam, Raviraj and Maheshwaran. Each one of them had carved a niche for himself in the Tamil polity and Sri Lankan society, for another Tamil to try slip into their shoes with ease and comfort. It would now take a new-generation moderate Tamil leader from the lower rungs of the Sinhala political establishment years and efforts before he could climb up the organisational ladder with similar comfort and rapidity as the slain leaders had done. Thanks to the killing, Fernandopulle's parliamentary seat too would now go to a Sinhala leader from the same party, not that it should hurt otherwise.

As is known, 'competitive killing' of Tamil leaders -- moderates and militants alike -- including Amirthalingam, Sabaratnam and Ketesh Loganathan, had had a similar effect. It was worse still in the case of the Tamil-speaking Muslim community – which first suffered at the hands of the LTTE, both in the North and the East alike, and more recently at the hands of the breakaway 'Karuna faction', re-christened politically as TMVP, since.

In the East, it is no more the case of the TMVP wanting to possess weapons in self-defence. Instead, it is more about one or the other Tamil group charging the TMVP with intimidation and elimination of fellow-Tamils. As far as the North is concerned, smaller Tamil groups like the EPDP too have not escaped the charge of Tamil-killing. It is another matter that EPDP leader Douglas Devananda may enter the 'Guinness Book of Records' for the number of attempts made on the life of a high-profile politician, who is now a Minister.

The less said about the Tamil polity, the better. So is the attitude of a section of the Tamil society in the country. They too have fallen for the dictum, "If you are not with us, you are against us." It is thus that the EPDP is not acceptable to many Tamils in the North, and the TMVP to their counterparts now in the East. To them, both are more violent and indiscriminate in their killings and are worse targets than the LTTE. To the other section of the Tamil society, whose numbers are unknown and whose voices are muted, the LTTE is the worst of them all. Yet, the fact remains that neither would accept the others as representatives of the Tamils, or at least of a miniscule section thereof.

It is no different in the case of moderate Tamil political forces like the TNA, TULF, EROS and EPRLF – the latter two having factions in the TNA on the one hand, and working with the decimated TULF, on the other. If some of them thought that going along with the majority Sinhala polity, either up to a point or beyond it, would be the best way to address the genuine concerns of the minority Tamil community, others, the stronger and larger ones, beg to differ. In doing so, each runs down the other more than anyone else.

Incidentally, leveraging electoral support for obtaining political rights was the line that parties representing the Malayaha Tamils first, and the Tamil-speaking Muslims later, adapted, in supporting one or the other of the 'southern Sinhala majors'. It is incidental that such an approach had minimised the losses and sufferings for the communities and constituencies concerned. Whether or not others follow such a course, they should have had no problems to leave those others to their ways and wisdom.

For the Tamils to assume a voice proportionate to their aspirations and concerns, they need to have their existing voices heard. Extinguishing them in the name of giving the community a greater voice is self-defeating, to say the least. With Tamils killing fellow Tamils in whatever name you can imagine, there may come a day when the vacuum could become too large to fill. There could then be no voice to be heard, either. After all, even in any 'Tamil homeland' of whatever kind, voices of dissent are inevitable, however stifled they could be. That is unless of course, the Tamils are heading for a leadership without a voice, or a voice without leadership – or, both