A mission left for the veteran TNA leader!

Today in Sri Lanka, there are over 70 political parties in this little island nation that is growing each year after 70 years of independence. It only acknowledge that all is not well due to various basic problems caused by greedy politicians of all shades on the people; and particularly all minorities living in all parts of the country will confirm this reality.

As a nation Sri Lankan could never solve these problems until there is a recognition by every community of the fact that it is these problems that still stands so much at the center of the nation, that was once a paradise that is preventing it to reach prosperity.

The nation’s challenges have evolved, after it gained independence in 1948, with fundamental problems and ethnic, religious, social and economic injustice remain.

Today there is the urgency to act and work together to achieve the destiny of Sri Lanka deserve, that many leaders spoke about with limited success; as much of the progress made by one government is put in danger when the next government comes to power. Further with independence a surge of majority nationalism was natural; but in a multi-ethic and multi-religious it should have been handled better. But greedy politicians to retain power over time produced their own interpretation of nationalism only to antagonize the minorities and the end did not justify the means. Regrettably, the politicians of the minorities reacted no better to result in deadly terror attacks on the people to inject dangerous toxin into nation’s political bloodstream.

Any effort by the people to force a change through the ballot box is undercut by a practice intended to establish an unfair political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating district boundaries, used in electoral systems, voter suppression and a political system that’s deeply polarized.

These challenges can seem like a mountain but need to climb that mountain by working with determination and realizing that power must be shared.

Today, there is a President with boldness and intention, who is prepared lead the people to triumph over fear and hate, with proper reconciliation as an alternative to the past violence and war, where human decency and compassion reign over poverty. For this to be a reality all people must be activated and mobilized to be unwavering in their commitment to make the difference and believe that the’re going to get there. This requires a mind set change from the people, particularly the Tamil speaking minorities. Most of them are still to recover from the set back caused by the three decades of civil war; lot needs to be done to bring their life to normalcy, for whom any talk of political settlement is only a mirage. All are achievable if there is political will, that can only be induced on the people by their political leaders. To this end, Hon. Ra Sampanthan, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) leader and Veteran Member of Parliament has a major role to play and make sacrifices for it.

The TNA leader need to first hold talk with the President to resolve matters that need clarification for the full implementation of the 13 Amendment of the constitution. For the President has expressed that certain clauses in it are not implementable; perhaps TNA thinks otherwise, then only avenue left is to discuss it with the President. Also there are issues connected to the Tamils that TNA wants to clear up with the government, which too could be resolved.

For the TNA sustaining its leadership as the representatives of the Tamils in Sri Lanka will get more difficult from here on for Mr. Sampanthan. Thus if they want to keep their self proclaimed position as the sole representatives of the Tamils they must start serving the whole Tamil speaking people in the land. TNA must first give respect the other political parties of the Tamil speaking people and earn respect, cannot stray away from this responsibility. In addition, continue the struggle to gain the lost rights of ethnic minorities, that is an important aspect. Further TNA must accept the reality that the destiny of the Tamils in Sri Lanka is tied up with the destiny of the Island nation; possible only if all their political parties work as a team.