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The selection of the chief minister was undoubtedly a difficult one for the president, as there were important reasons for the appointment of both Pillayan and Hizbullah to the chief minister’s post. Pillayan had the merit of obtaining the highest number of votes in the election, though it is reasonable to believe that a significant number of them were obtained by stuffing ballot boxes, impersonation and intimidation. A more compelling reason for the appointment of Pillayan as chief minister would be the TMVP’s contribution to the government’s victory over the LTTE in the Eastern Province. The TMVP provided, and continues to provide, invaluable intelligence to the government’s security forces.
On the other hand, Hizbullah too had reasons to expect to be appointed as the chief minister. During the period of the election campaign when the issue of who would be appointed came up, President Rajapaksa promised the position to the leader of the group that won the most seats. Most of the government’s seats at the eastern election were won by Muslim candidates. Indeed, most of the seats in the entire Provincial Council were won by Muslim candidates, making Hizbullah the person on the government side most likely to command the allegiance of the majority of members of the Eastern Provincial Council.
In these circumstances it was no cause for surprise that President Rajapaksa delayed taking a decision on appointing the chief minister. The government continues to see the solution to the ethnic conflict as lying in the military suppression of the LTTE and therefore the democratic potential of the Eastern Provincial Council is to be subordinated to the military imperative. The government’s reliance upon the TMVP to maintain military control over the east was a virtually insurmountable obstacle to the hopes for a Muslim representative to be appointed as the chief minister.
However, the fatal weakness in the government’s strategy of conflict resolution is that militarily evicting the LTTE from territory over which it has administrative control will not necessarily eliminate the LTTE’s ability to be present in those areas. The insurmountable problem that the government faces is that so long as there is no political solution to the ethnic conflict, the LTTE will be able to maintain its support base amongst the Tamil people and undertake its operations especially in areas where they are present.
It is also evident that the government’s maximum efforts to prevent the LTTE from launching guerilla and terror strikes against military and civilian targets are only having limited success. Whether it was the suicide attack against police buses in the heart of Colombo or a bus bomb in a suburb outside Colombo, the most stringent security precautions have not worked.
On the other hand, by bringing in the TMVP, consisting of former LTTE cadre, into contesting elections that are within the framework of a united country, the government has shown the possibility of the LTTE doing the same some time in the future. The government has shown that an armed Tamil group can be accommodated within the structures of governance even while they are armed, so long as they do not present their fight as one for separation.
The challenge for the government is to show the Tamil people and world that the existing system of devolution can be made to work. Some nationalist groups associated with the government have objected to the granting of powers over police and land to the Eastern Provincial Council, which have so far not been devolved to any other province. The significance of granting those special powers to the Eastern Provincial Council is that they will make it easier for the TMVP to transform its armed units into a legitimate police force.
Further, the devolution of power over land would also serve to reassure the Tamil people that their fear of government-sponsored Sinhalese settlements in the north and east will be less likely in the future. The government’s success in making the Eastern Provincial Council rise to its full potential is that it will provide the LTTE and the Tamil people with the opening to negotiate for a greater degree of power and rights in the country, on condition that they put aside the demand for a separate Tamil state in the manner of the TMVP.
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(Dr. Jehan Perera is executive director of the National Peace Council of Sri Lanka, an independent advocacy organization. He studied economics at Harvard College and holds a doctorate in law from Harvard Law School. ©Copyright Jehan Perera.)
