PTOMS, THE SUPREME COURT AND THE WEST
The Supreme Court has given an interim injunction against few clauses of the MoU regarding the PTOMS. It is mainly the authority of the bodies that were set up to deal with financial matters that have come under the investigation of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court appears to believe that the financial matters pertaining to the district committees should be directed through the Parliament. The Supreme Court is also of the view that the head office of the district committee should be located at a place other than Killinochchi, and that it should be easily accessible to the public without any problem.
While the Sinhala nationalists may feel that they have won a point on their way to safeguard the sovereignty of the state, we have to reiterate that it is only an interim injunction and we have to await the final order before anything concrete could be said. However it is viewed as a set back for the Tamil racists and the Norwegians who were behind the MoU on PTOMS. We do not know at the time of writing this column, the response of the LTTE, but judging by the comments of members of their proxy party, the TNA, it is likely that the LTTE will oppose any attempt by the "government" of Sri Lanka to amend the MoU based on the interim injunction issued by the Supreme Court.
There were some ministers who have not handled even a "Suruttu kade", informing the public that the LTTE had accepted the government of Sri Lanka as a "legal constitutional body" (not exactly the words used by the ministers) and entered into an MoU. However, what is important is that any outside country that recognises the Sri Lankan "Government", could enter into agreements based on that condition. The outside countries recognise the "sovereignty" of Sri Lanka, and the agreements they sign with Sri Lanka are based on that recognition. Thus LTTE signing a MoU with the government of Sri Lanka does not imply that the terrorists have recognised the sovereignty of the state over the entire country. As far as the LTTE is concerned the sovereignty of Sri Lanka is confined to the provinces other than the northern and the eastern provinces. When the LTTE comes to an agreement with the "government" it is on the basis of two "independent" governments with sovereignty over two different regions. LTTE does not accept that the "government" of Sri Lanka has sovereignty over the northern and the eastern provinces.
As we have already mentioned in these columns, the so called high level committee that has control over the tsunami affected regions in the entire country, and not only over those areas in the northern and the eastern provinces, is nothing but the proto confederation that the LTTE wants to establish. It is the confederation of Sri Lanka and Eelam, giving the LTTE the opportunity of establishing the Eelam whenever they want to do so. The district committee with its centre at Killinochchi was to be the proto Eelam with sovereignty over the northern and the eastern provinces. The district committee was not required to be responsible to the parliament and its funds were to be handled by an independent body that had links with the "international community". The chairperson of the district committee was to be a member appointed by the LTTE.
The Supreme Court interim injunction changes some of those provisions. The centre would now have to be located at some place other than Killinochchi, the provisional capital of Eelam, and the body that handles finance of the district committee would have to be responsible to the parliament. What would be the outcome of the interim injunction? How would the LTTE respond to the new situation. It is very unlikely that the LTTE would agree to comply with the "government", if the President wants to amend the MoU in respect of PTOMS. However, we should not exclude that possibility altogether as it all depends on the strategy adopted by the west to establish a second Philippine in the region. This second philippine is nothing but the second Christian (Catholic) country in the region, in the form of Eelam.
The most interesting about turn that the west took in regard of its policy towards PTOMS (and Eelam) was in respect of the funds provided to the district committee. All of a sudden the west (including Japan) led by US became aware that the chairperson was going to be a member of the LTTE, an organisation that is proscribed in US for terrorist activities. The west decided that it was wrong for them to supply money to a body that is headed by the LTTE. The western countries including Japan stated that they would not supply funds to PTOMS.
It is interesting to note that the Supreme Court had no objection to the composition of the district committee nor to the fact that the chairperson of the latter would be a member appointed by the LTTE. However, if a body that is responsible to the parliament was to be established to be in control of the finance of the district committee then the west would not find any constraints in supplying funds to PTOMS. Though the Supreme Court would have had other reasons for its interim injunction, its decision helps the western countries more than anybody else.
The million pound question is why did not the western countries object to the clauses on financial matters of the district committee before the MoU in respect of PTOMS was signed. Surely they would have known the contents of the MoU to be signed, from Solheim and others. When the draft of the MoU was available to people such as Kumar Rupasinghe, one does not believe that the embassies for the western countries were ignorant of the contents of the MoU. The west that did not object to the fact that the finance would be handled by a body with a LTTE nominee as the chairperson, all of a sudden realised that it was wrong for them to finance such a body.
We do not believe that the west agreed to the draft of the MoU in order to see that the JVP would quit the "Sandhanaya", though they would have welcomed the decision of the JVP to leave the alliance. The strategy of the west would be revealed by the response of the LTTE to the interim injunction. However, it might take some time as the LTTE is not compelled to react to the change in the position as a result of the interim injunction. The LTTE would be forced to response only if the government makes an attempt to amend the MoU in respect of PTOMS, in the light of the Supreme Court decision. In the event the LTTE decides to oppose any amendments, then it would be the end of not only the MoU on PTOMS but the other MoU signed by Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe and Prabhakaran. The so called peace and the ceasefire agreement would come to an end. LTTE would go back to suicidal bombers and Colombo would again experience bomb blasts.
The so called ceasefire was never a ceasefire as the LTTE did not stop its attacks on the armed forces including the intelligence personnel. Whenever some official was killed by the LTTE, the "government" issued its customary message of sympathy condemning the act. It was a ceasefire only for the armed forces and the so called monitors who are wasting our time (they do not waste their time as they are paid for the "services" rendered to the LTTE) could only say that they did not have the power to stop any of those attacks by the LTTE. These monitors have indicated on several occasions that they do not have the powers of class monitors in schools. During the time in which the so called ceasefire was in operation, the LTTE refrained from exploding bombs in Colombo. That was the only "achievement" of the first MoU, and those who think that Colombo is Sri Lanka were happy.
If the "ceasefire" ends the LTTE would commence exploding bombs in Colombo, and the west instead of financing the PTOMS could supply money to the terrorists to engage in their terrorist activities. It would be change from "peace" to "war" and "peace" . These words are written as "peace", "war" as there is no peace as such and also there is no war as such as there are no two countries to engage in war. The change form "peace" to "peace" and "war" would see to it that bombs are exploded in Colombo.
It may be that the west realised that the PTOMS would not succeed in establishing the Eelam or the second Philippine, as such bogus bodies as the district committee would not function the way the westerners wanted them to do. The people would not have recognised them as genuine bodies and the bodies would have died a natural death. The west most probably wanted to kill the district committee even before it was born instead of allowing it to experience a natural death. Or it may be that the west is now burdened with Ms. Chandrika Kumaratunga as the President and wants to make Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe the President. The best way to get Mr. RW elected as the president is by destabilising the government of Ms. Kumaratunga. The bombs in Colombo would do the trick.
On the other hand Thamilselvam may be forced to accept the amendments to the MoU, and establish a district committee in addition to the national committee to which a cabinet minister has been appointed by secretary to a ministry thus exposing the PTOMS "Nadagama", if the west is interested only in nominal structures on its way to establish an Eelam. It is too early to speculate on the strategy of the west, but what is certain is that they have been helped by the decision of the Supreme Court, and that the west has not dissociated from its aim of establishing a second Philippine.
Professor Nalin de Silva
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