Pillay urged to meet polls monitors, all candidates 

Dasun Edirisinghe reporting from Kilinochchi-August 25, 2013, 10:12 pm

A local election monitoring group, Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE), yesterday said that visiting United Nations Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay should meet all other political parties and independent groups contesting the Northern Provincial Council election, if she decides to meet the TNA candidates.

Addressing a media conference here, CaFFE Executive Director Keerthi Tennakoon said that as a responsible human rights official she should look into the rights of all candidates who were in the fray.

Answering a question, he said that Pillay was scheduled to meet only the candidates of the Tamil National Alliance (Illankai Tamil Arsu Kachchi), contesting the Northern Provincial Council polls from the Jaffna District, during her visit to the province.Tennakoon said that as the UN’s human rights chief, she should ensure the rights of all candidates in the fray otherwise the TNA would get an unethical political advantage by meeting her in Jaffna.

The senior observer said that meeting the candidates of just one party contesting the Northern Provincial Council polls was very similar to violating election laws and using state vehicles in campaigning for the North -Western and Central Provincial Councils in the run up to the September 21 election.

While paying attention to probing alleged human rights violations during the final phase of humanitarian operations in the Northern Province, it was equally important to honour the election laws, Tennakoon said.

He said that members of the civil organizations in the area, especially of the war affected people, were the better observers of the election than outside monitors as they knew the people of their areas and their movements well.

"Civil organizations must get together to protect the rights of people in the province," Tennakoon said adding that people must cooperate with the three forces and police to develop the war affected province as the government had implemented several mega development projects in the north.

Tennakoon said that neither foreign nor local NGOs could solve problems of the Northerners and solutions to their problems should come from themselves.