It is madness of the first order to ask Sampanthan and Sumanthiran to resign their posts

It is madness of the first order to ask Sampanthan and Sumanthiran to resign their posts

It is madness of the first order to ask Sampanthan and Sumanthiran to resign their posts. After their resignation what happens? Siva is a lotus eater living in a dream world of his own devoid of reality. The past struggles did not end in outright victory. Nor it ended in total failures. After a period of 27 years, Tamil was declared an official language like Sinhala. By the 13th amendment we, have a semi-autonomous council with 5 Board of Ministers.  There are now two centres of power, the centre and the provincial. Provincial Councils can legislate on subjects that come under the purview of the Provincial list. They can also legislate over some subjects mentioned in the concurrent list.

What is now required is more powers to manage local affairs, including powers over land and police. These powers are there in the 13th Amendment and Provincial Council Act, but the government has so far failed to create the mechanisms like the Land Commission and the Police Commission. Still, we can make the best use of the existing powers to develop our war-torn country. Unfortunately, the present incumbent viz the Chief Minister do not believe in economic development before a political settlement is worked out. What is best is to fight for both simultaneously. One should not wait for the other.

The living standards of our people should be improved by providing houses, health-care, job opportunities micro-financing for small-scale industries and agriculture. The NPC’s Operating budget is Rs. 25 billion (Rs.25,000 million) for the financial year 2018. The NPC employs about 30,000 employees.