About 78.5 per cent of 4.25 lakh people of Northern Province, who voted in the Provincial Council elections on September 21, have given the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) a thumping victory.
The TNA won 30 seats, including two bonus seats in the 38-member council while the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) secured seven seats and the Sri lanka Muslim Congress (SlMC) won one seat.
The results were not unexpected, but the large voter turnout of 67.5 per cent evidently boosted the TNA figures. The TNA’s performance points to the broad acceptance of its reading of political aspirations reflected in its manifesto. It went into the election after some introspection with its diaspora patrons and Tamil intellectuals. This resulted in the TNA naming an apolitical personality — retired Sri lanka Supreme Court judge CV Wigneswaran — as its chief ministerial candidate. This prevented it from dissipating its energies in a leadership struggle between the three major parties that dominate the five-member conglomerate.
Justice Wigneswaran enjoyed excellent national reputation as a jurist and did not belong to any party. Any doubts about his belief in the Tamil cause vanished after he delivered the Thanthai Chelvanayagam lecture “Whither Sri lankan Tamils” at Colombo on April 25, 2013. The rhetoric and nuance of the speech appealed to most of the Tamils, despite some unorthodox views. Undoubtedly, the choice of Wigneswaran helped the TNA broaden its support base. Probably this persuaded a large number of voters to support the TNA after their energies have been sapped by two-and-a-half decades of war.
He also fitted in the TNA bid to project a new image distancing itself from its tainted political association with V Prabhakaran while retaining the idiom of ‘Tamil Nation’ at its core. This desire has made the manifesto more a vision statement than a mission statement, listing specific objectives of the Party. For instance, it reaffirmed the Tamil’s right of self-determination and the desire to find a solution to satisfy the Tamil aspirations within a federal structure, as stated in Oslo Communiqué. The TNA failed to pursue this objective when it meekly bowed down to Prabhakaran and allowed him to be the sole arbiter of Tamils in the peace process with disastrous results.
To resuscitate this objective in the present context of Sri lanka is going to be an uphill task because much water has flown in the Kelaniya river since then. The reality is the lTTE has been eliminated as an extraconstitutional rider on finding a solution to the Tamil issue. President Rajapaksa has been elected twice after disowning the federal solution and wishing away the existence of any ethnic problem in Sri lanka. Tamils have been reduced to play their weakest political wicket now. And last but not the least, there is a Government “showing signs of heading in an increasingly authoritarian direction” (to quote UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Naveneetham Pillay at the end of her recent visit to Sri lanka).
Now the TNA in office has no choice but to build an equation with Colombo to fulfil the expectations it has kindled among the people. This is going to be a trying task for the TNA as a whole and the Chief Minister in particular. If there is anyone who can undertake the task well, it is probably the Chief Minister designate Wigneswaran. As a Tamil judge at the highest court of the nation he had walked the tight-rope through the trying period of ethnic conflict. Though he is a non-political personality he has the acumen and ability to take informed decisions while dealing with the Government.
Wigneswaran needs everyone’s good wishes to succeed in his thankless task of getting the job done. And that includes not only his electors, but also TNA leaders and the Rajapaksa Government.
The writer is a retired Military Intelligence specialist on South Asia, served with the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri lanka as Head of Intelligence