The election manifesto of the Tamil National Peoples’ Front (TNPF) comes out with an option for confederation of Tamil and Sinhala nations in the island, said former MP Selvarajah Kajendren to Tamil media on Wednesday. While stressing on Tamil homeland, nationalism, self-determination and nation of identifiable sovereignty as political aspirations, the other distinguishing features of the election manifesto of the TNPF were demand to repeal the 6th Amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution, inclusion of the diaspora in the political processes of Eezham Tamils and an outlook to involve the international community in providing security and support to the political struggle of Tamils. The All Ceylon Tamil Congress led by Mr. Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, which came out of the TNA alliance recently is the major constituent of TNPF.
"In fact, the ball is in the court of Colombo and the powers backing it. It is they who have to come out with an acceptable model of political solution. Tamils on their own need not compromise their political aspirations, because every time Tamils compromised, that was misused by Sinhala politicians. The confederation model is only an option of ours, if at all we are hard pressed to come out with an option," said the former Member of Parliament Mr. S. Kajendren.
By opting for the political model of confederation with the right to secede, the TNPF comes out with the maximum possible proposal permitted for any political party in the island under the current constitution of Sri Lanka, political observers said.
The TNPF simultaneously demanding to repeal the 6th Amendment to the Constitution that has long disenfranchised Tamils from democratically expressing their aspirations is also significant, the observers said.
Unlike the vague mention of shared sovereignty blunted by simultaneous mention of unspecified federalism, the confederation model unambiguously spells out how the solution should be based on joint sovereignty of nations that retain their respective sovereignties, TNPF circles told media.
“After May 2009, diaspora Tamil community came out with programmes such as referendum on independent and sovereign Tamil Eelam, Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam and Country Councils in the diaspora.”
“But, on the other hand, some sections of political leadership in the home country think of abandoning homeland, nation, self-determination and sovereignty and think of going back to the days prior to the Vaddukkoaddai Resolution. They push Tamils into the track of defeatism and criticize those who uphold the sovereignty of Tamils as hardliners,” the manifesto said.
In the past, every Tamil compromise was misused by the Sinhala state of Mahavamsa mindset. While keeping Tamil nation, its right to self-determination and sovereignty beyond compromise, the model suggested by TNPF to keep the country of two nations together as equal partners, provides a meeting point for the removal of the fears of both the Tamils and the Sinhalese. The model also should satisfy removing the fears of India about having two countries at its southern borders and at the same time should satisfy the liberal democratic economic aspirations of the West, the manifesto further said.
In the era of corporate colonial conquests, the Eezham Tamil diaspora forming an appropriate political formation and its co-function with the polity of Eezham Tamils in the home country is the greatest asset of Eezham Tamils in addressing the issues globally. The only political alliance that has positively recognised and incorporated this aspect in the manifesto is the TNPF, political observers said.
The observers keenly watching the statements of the TNA leaders before and after the release of the TNA manifesto said that the All Ceylon Tamil Congress leaving the TNA alliance had a big impact on TNA coming out with certain concepts having the semblance of Tamil sovereignty in its manifesto to pre-empt the TNPF, but the TNA doesn’t show any seriousness about them in its campaign elucidations.
Even though ordinary people don’t get the nuances of political concepts and models of solution through terminologies, they understand them and the political personalities behind them in their gut feelings, the observers further said.
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