The gulf between the government and the Tamil parties has only widened in the recent past
by P K Balachandran in Daily Mirror, Dec 7, 2022
Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe will be meeting the Tamil parties of the Northern and Eastern Provinces on December 11 to find a solution to the longstanding Tamil issue.
But the chances of a solution emerging look extremely dim given the fact that the gulf between the government and the Tamils has widened in the past few months thanks to Wickremesinghe’s statements. The abject failure of past engagements between Sri Lankan governments and the Tamils is also casting a shadow on the forthcoming talks.
Wickremesinghe proposes to devolve powers to the Districts rather than the Provinces, as is the case now. But the Tamil parties will, on no account, accept that. For the Tamils, the President’s proposal is tantamount to breaking the Tamils’ unity.
The Tamils see the Sinhalese as a single political block and are eager to face them as a single Tamil block. This is why they have been asking for the unification of the Tamil-speaking Northern and Eastern provinces or, at the very least, meaningful devolution of power to the existing two Tamil-speaking provinces. But the Sinhalese argue that district-wise devolution will be more democratic and meaningful. And, at any rate, the majority Sinhalese fear that ethno-based Provinces would lead to minority power and even secession.
From the time of Sri Lanka’s independence in 1948, to date, the issue of devolution has bedeviled relations between governments backed by the majority Sinhalese on the one hand, and the minority Tamils on the other.
Nevertheless, the two sides have periodically engaged in talks albeit punctuated by rioting, military action and terrorist acts. They are now going to talk again due to pressure from India and the West. Talks will also get Western support for obtaining an IMF bailout.
An encouraging factor is that, in the past, talks had brought workable ideas to the table. And that could well be the case this time too. In the past, these ideas were abandoned due to an ensemble of primordial ethnic fears, crass political competition, the rise of Tamil militancy and the hardening Sinhalese majoritarian ethos. If these factors are minimized, and if commitment on the part of the leadership to find a solution is shown, the December 11 talks could end in ethnic reconciliation.
B-C Pact
The Bandaranaike-Chelvanayagam Pact (B-C Pact) of July 1957 was the most promising to date. If it had been implemented, Sri Lanka would not have had a 30-year war.
The B-C Pact provided for ‘Regional Councils’ (RCs) with delegated power over a wide range of subjects like agriculture, co-operatives, lands and land development, colonization, health, education, industries and fisheries, housing and social services, electricity, water schemes and roads. The RCs were given powers to tax and borrow. The Northern Province would constitute one region and the Eastern Province would contain two or more regions.
Tamil was recognized as a ‘national minority language’ with provision for its use in the Provincial administration and courts in the North and East. Colonization schemes would not be used to convert the Northern and Eastern Provinces into Sinhalese-majority areas. The RCs were to have powers of land alienation, and also to select personnel to work on such schemes.
The leading Tamil party, The Federal Party, responded positively to the B-C Pact, but the opposition United National Party (UNP) agitated against it on the grounds that it would destroy the unity of Sri Lanka. As a consequence, Prime Minister S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike tore-up the pact.
