Sri Lanka: First Take On NPC Elections
By R Hariharan - September 22, 2013 |
Col. (retd) R.Hariharan
About 78.5 percent of 4.25 lakh people of Northern Province who voted in the Provincial Council elections on September 21, 2013 have given the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) a thumping victory. The TNA won 30 seats including 2 bonus seats in the 38-member council while the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) secured 7 seats and the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) won 1 seat.
The results were not unexpected; but the large voter turnout of 67.5 percent evidently boosted the TNA figures. TNA’s performance point to the broad acceptance of its reading of political aspirations reflected in its manifesto.
The TNA went into the election after some introspection with its Diaspora patrons and Tamil intellectuals.This resulted in TNA naming an apolitical personality – retired Sri Lanka Supreme Court judge CV Wigneswaran – as its chief ministerial candidate. This prevented TNA from dissipating its energies in a leadership struggle between the three major parties that dominate the five-member conglomerate.
Justice Wigneswaran enjoyed excellent national reputation as a jurist and did not belong to any party. Any doubts about his belief in the Tamil Cause vanished after he delivered the Thanthai Chelvanayagam Lecture “Whither Sri Lankan Tamils” at Colombo on April 25, 2013. The rhetoric and the nuance of speech appealed to most of the Tamils, despite some unorthodox views. Undoubtedly, choice of Wigneswaran helped the TNA’s to broaden its support base as he was apolitical and belonged to no special interest group. Probably this persuaded large number of voters to support TNA after their energies have been sapped by two and a half decades of war.
He also fitted in the TNA bid to project a new image distancing itself from its tainted political association with Prabhakaran while retaining the idiom of ‘Tamil Nation’ at its core. This desire has made the manifesto more a vision statement than a mission statement listing specific objectives of the Party.
