Will Sri Lanka Follow The Example Of Nepal?
By Veluppillai Thangavelu –April 18, 2016
Veluppillai Thangavelu
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has consistently called for power sharing arrangements in a merged Northern and Eastern Provinces based on a Federal structure in a manner acceptable to the Tamil Speaking Muslim people. In all the elections held since May, 2009 voters have given a clear mandate to the TNA’s manifestos calling for a federal form of government giving Northern and Eastern provinces maximum autonomy.
In the parliamentary elections held in April, 2010 within a year after the war ended and thousands of internally displaced persons confined to camps and the occupied armed forces and pro-government armed groups calling the shots, the TNA still obtained 233,190 votes (2.90%) nationally and won 14 out of 225 seats in parliament. In the parliamentary elections held in August, 2015 the TNA increased its share of votes as well as seats dramatically by polling 515,067 (4.62%) votes nationally and winning 16 out of 225 seats. This is an increase of 281,967 (54.75%) over votes polled during 2010 elections.
Contesting the second election for the de-merged Eastern province in 2012, the TNA received 193,387 votes (30.59) and won 11 out of 37 seats. It conceded the bonus seats to the UPFA by a narrow margin of 6,217 (0.99) votes.
At the 2013 Northern Provincial Council election, the first since 1988, the TNA secured 78.48% of the votes and won 30 of the 38 seats. C. V. Wigneswaran, TNA Chief Ministerial candidate was sworn in as the first democratically elected Chief Minister of the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) on 7th October 2013.
The following Table 1 shows the details of voting in elections held in the Northern and Eastern provinces since May, 2009.
Thus, TNA has steadily increased its vote bank as the grip of the army and para – military groups hold on the people began to diminish. It may be recalled that both the Northern and Eastern provinces were virtually under military rule with retired Sinhalese army commanders functioning as Governors with executive powers. This situation continued till January, 2015 when civilians replaced the military governors.
The TNA also proved its dominant role in politics when at the 2015 presidential election it decided to support common opposition candidate Maithripala Sirisena. Table 2 below shows the results of the voting in the Northern and Eastern provinces in support of the common candidate Maithripala Sirisena with comparative figures for the previous elections held in January 2010.
