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NPC calls for bipartisan approach

The National Peace Council (NPC) yesterday urged the government and the Opposition to work together towards a political solution in the wake of the announcement in Oslo that the government and the LTTE had agreed on a federal model.

In a news release issued yesterday, the NPC said the government and main opposition party already stand on common ground with respect to a political solution based on federal principles.

"We urge them to put political rivalries to a side and find means to collaborate to make a permanent and a just peace a reality for all communities inhabiting Sri Lanka," the NPC said.

The NPC said: "We welcome the declaration by both the government's chief negotiator, Prof. G. L. Peiris and the LTTE's chief negotiator Dr Anton Balasingham that the Norwegian-led and internationally-backed peace process had become irreversible.

The commitment by the two sides not to go back to war as means of achieving their political goals indicates their willingness to make compromises for the sake of peace. This willingness to make compromises needs to encompass the political opposition that has unfortunately become marginalised in the peace process.

With the success of the government-LTTE peace talks, it is the absence of government-opposition understanding and cooperation with regard to the peace process that emerges as a major threat to its sustainability. Now that the framework of a political solution is in place, the National Peace Council believes that a joint committee that includes the major opposition party should be set up to work out the content of the political solution.

Without the backing of the opposition, and a two-thirds majority in Parliament, it would be difficult to ensure changes to the country's Constitution that would permit and create confidence that a lasting political solution has been reached.

It would be unrealistic to expect the LTTE to make a full transition from a military organisation to a political one in the absence of a bipartisan political consensus on the future Constitution of Sri Lanka. There must be a guarantee that what one ruling party signs today, another ruling party will not undermine tomorrow.

Less than a fortnight ago, the Presidential Secretariat issued a statement in which President Chandrika Kumaratunga said that "the PA was the only political party to spell out its devolution of power proposal as a draft constitution in 1997 and still upheld the devolution of power along a federalist or Indian model within a united Sri Lanka."

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