By: Roy Wignarajah
Sri Lanka's Tamil Civil society organizations in collaboration with the major Tamil political parties announced former Tamil National Alliance MP, Mr. Packiaselvam .Ariyaneththiran as the common candidate for the upcoming presidential run scheduled for September 21.
The announcement was made public on Aug 8, by veteran politician and lawyer N Srikantha. The ceremonial announcement was made at the Thanthai Selva memorial hall, the building constructed in honour of the late SJV Chelvanayakam QC, revered as the father of the Tamil nation and the founder of the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (Federal Party).
Mr.Ariyaneththiran represented the Tamils from the Batticaloa district of the merged Northeast province of Sri Lanka during the war days from 2004 and again from 2010 to 2015 in the Sri Lankan parliament.
Since the improper decolonization of Ceylon by the British in 1948, the Tamils of Sri Lanka have been facing a systematic genocide and a systemic discrimination.
Various rounds of negotiations between the 1950s - 1970s under the leadership of the late SJV Chelvanayakam, with the Sinhala dominated governments proved futile.
Pacts signed to resolve the Tamils' grievances with two different Prime Minister's were torn under pressure from Sinhala extremists and Buddhist monks and Peaceful agitations by Tamil leaders were met with police brutality.
The continued discriminative policies against the Tamils gave rise to Tamil militancy in the early seventies and evolved into a full scale war with the Sinhala dominated governments, in 2009 the Tamils' resistance war was brought to an ugly end by the Sri Lankan government resulting in the Tamil Genocide reaching its heights in Mullivaikal on May 18, 2009.
Mahindra Percival Rajapakse, Sri Lanka's president who brought the war to end failed to deliver justice to the Tamils after the war and continued with the discriminative policies even more aggressively.
The Sinhala governments played cat and mouse with India and the US with the help of China and still continue to do so marginalizing the Tamils even further. Due to the continuing discriminative anti Tamil policies of the Sinhala governments, the enormous access to economical and intellectual resources available through their kith and kin abroad, are denied to a great extent to Sri Lanka’s Tamils.
Exhausted with all democratic avenues, continued marginalization and engagement with the UNO's mechanisms Tamils of Sri Lanka are at crossroads in relation to the upcoming presidential polls.
It is in this context the concept of a common candidate for the Tamils took birth and the candidate was announced.
Since Aug 8, Tamils on ground and in the Diaspora, with a high degree of enthusiasm have been waiting for the Elections Commission to confirm Mr. Ariyaneththiran’s Candidacy. The six day wait came to an end today with the confirmation and acceptance of the conch as Mr. Ariyaneththiran’s election symbol.
According to political commentators, the Tamils of Sri Lanka are once again; set to write another historic chapter in their quest for the right to self determination. Mr. Ariyaneththiran's presudential bid is another history in the making for the Tamil Nation.The votes, the Tamil common candidate garners will send a clear message to the Sinhala rulers and the international community, of the united stand of the Tamils in their quest to win their democratic rights to govern themselves as a nation of people inhabiting the North and Eastern provinces and parts of the hill country provinces of Sri Lanka.
As such momentum in support of the Tamil common candidate has started building both in the Diaspora and on ground. The Tamils of Sri Lanka are once again gearing to show their united stand in the September 21 polls, as they did on July 21 1977.