| Bandaranaike family never upraise racism in this country: Chandrika |
| [ Friday, 27 September 2013, 04:23.35 AM GMT +05:30 ] |
  Former president Chandrika Bandaranike said that the Bandaranaike family never upraise racism in this country. |
| For the past 80 Bandaranike family engage politics in the Athanegala electorate and no communal violations reported in this area. Former Prime Minister S.W.R.D.Bandaranika establishes SriLanka Freedom Party to benefit people. However at present some others say they are the owners of this party. At present people are willing to ethnic differences among people. Some are willing to create religious differences. Government and police fail to take action against racists. My father did not introduce Sinhala act to work against minorities of this country. He introduces the act to grant reliefs for locals during the time of colonial period. On this period Tamil leader never called upon separate state. Especially Chelvanayakam did not fight to establish separate state. He always request to grant justice for Tamil nationals. |
SLFP Is Not A Racist Party: CBK
September 27, 2013
Racism and religious extremism have no place in the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, former President Chandrika Kumaratunga said at the commemoration of her father S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike’s death yesterday.
Mahinda and Chandrika
Addressing a crowd during the ceremonies to commemorate the former Sri Lankan Premier, Kumaratunga said that the pact signed between her father and Federal Party Leader, popularly known as the Banda-Chelva Agreement, went far beyond the power sharing provisions of the 13th Amendment.
“At that time, the Federal Party was asking for power sharing under a federal system,” she said.
“Nowadays they are speaking of too many powers in the 13th Amendment. The Banda-Chelva pact was willing to share power far more significantly than that,” the former President said.
The SLFP was started with the Bandaranayake vision, said Kumaratunga, adding that in these days various convoluted visions had been incorporated into the party.
“Of late various people claim their fathers created the SLFP along with my father – at that time I don’t think they were around,” she charged.
Defending her father’s controversial Sinhala Only Act, Kumaratunga said it was an attempt to uphold the rights of the majority that had been suppressed by European colonialists for hundreds of years. “He also brought the Tamil language bill at the same time. He had no intention to implement racist policies. But because he was assassinated, there was no way to enact that bill,” President Kumaratunga said.
