Back To Barracks Necessary For Free And Fair NPC Elections
Dr. Laksiri Fernando
After an end of a war or a comprehensive peace agreement (CPA), ‘decommissioning and demobilization’ are considered crucially important for sustainable peace. These are universally accepted principles although the Sri Lankan ‘rulers,’ though elected formally, have some contempt about them, for reasons best known to them.
Instead of asking as far as ‘decommissioning or demobilization,’ the TNA Parliamentary Group Leader and the President of ITAK, R Sampanthan, has requested the President “to take steps to confine the military to the barracks and remove the biggest obstacle to the conduct of a free and fair poll on the 21st of September” for the Northern Provincial Council (NPC).
The government may be commended for holding the elections to the NPC, at last, although it should have been done ‘soon’ after the end of the war in May 2009. This is what was done in the Eastern Province, after the area was cleared from the LTTE menace. Even ‘how soon’ could have been flexible, but holding it long after almost four and half years is not good for reconciliation or sustainable peace. If it was held within a year, the situation could have been entirely different.
It is possible that the extreme chauvinist forces such as the JHU within the government was holding back the President, perhaps connivance with the Defense Secretary, not to hold the elections as clear from their stance on the now aborted 19th Amendment to abolish the 13th Amendment altogether. Now they have withdrawn from the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) in finding a ‘constitutional solution’ to the controversy. The decisive factor in holding the NPC elections undoubtedly is the international pressure whether one likes it or not.
Same goes for the military control of the North, not to speak of ‘decommissioning and demobilization’ for a moment. The ‘defense establishment’ takes considerable pains to explain to the international community and/or the UN about the military withdrawals from the North. However, the two terms – decommissioning and demobilization – have never entered into their vocabulary. ‘Decommissioning’ means the withdrawal of the military from active engagement in public affairs (i.e. law and order) and ‘demobilization’ means the gradual reduction of armed forces from a war situation to a peace situation.Read More
