Ranil gets bloody hampers from the LTTE

It's obviously festive time for the UNP and its leader. The LTTE is giving him festive hampers of those killed, for celebration. Each new killing of troops pushes back the threat to his leadership of the party, giving him the chance to position himself the person whose dire warnings of imminent war were ignored by the majority of those who polled.

With hardly any reasoning behind his statement Ranil Wickremesinghe blames the JVP and the JHU for the current situation in the country and goes on to state that the LTTE which not so long ago agreed for an internal administration is now insisting on a separate state. This is all very good for the "I told you so" type of politics.

On further analysis it is not a case of "I told you so" but a case of "I knew it all along". The apparent glee of the UNP leader about the LTTE's latest killing spree, which has already been condemned by the UN Secretary General too, gives cause for suspicion that what the LTTE is doing today is part of joint conspiracy with the UNP.

Is it the much denied "Ali-Koti" or the Jumbo-Tiger Agreement in full action? It looks as if the LTTE is making up for what it did in the Presidential Elections in the North, which made Ranil Wickremesinghe, with unusual clairvoyance about the secrecy of the ballot; claim it was the absence of voters in the North that deprived him of victory.

His obvious delight in reactions to the blood letting in the country gives one the impression that the LTTE is in fact making every possible move to destabilize the newly formed government of President Mahinda Rajapakse, and he enjoys every such move.

There must be others too, who spoke of the need for a national government with the UNP and SLFP, and sought to obstruct Mahinda Rajapakshe's victory, who must also be enjoying this national tragedy.

The more such destabilisation the more joy for the UNP's leader, as it first helps silence his opponents within the UNP, and also helps to project himself as the person who can bring down the numbers killed and the frequency of killings.

He is making every attempt to show that the situation today is the fulfilment of the warning he gave the people that the election of Mahinda Rajapakse would inevitably lead to war and very soon too.

He has already forgotten saying he would be glad not only to join forces with the SLFP to achieve peace, but would also be happy to have the JVP in such an alliance. Now that the SLFP won without accepting his offer of help, but rather the open support of the JVP, the reds have to be blamed as the bad boys once again, along with the JHU, which did not line up the yellow robes behind him.

A bloody silence

There is reason in the UNP leader's analysis of the LTTE's new surge of terror. Is it because President Mahinda Rajapakse was in political alliance with the JVP and the JHU that the LTTE is carrying out these cowardly terrorist attacks on Armed Services personnel ? What is there to prove this charge ? Or else, is it not more likely that the LTTE is trying to drive fear into the Government and the Sinhalese people, in a manner sufficient to bring them crawling to the negotiating table with the title deed of the State of Eelam in their hands.

He maintains a bloody silence about naming who the killers are. The letters LTTE do not allow slip out of his mouth even by mistake. Very careful about such a slip he is. Instead he points the finger at the JVP and JHU for the current situation.

Was the grenade thrown into a military bunker that led to the first killings thrown by members or even supporters of the JVP or JHU ?

What is it that prevents him from telling the country he even suspects the LTTE of having done that ?

Was it the JVP or JHU that planted the claymore mine blasting the tractor that killed seven troops including an officer last Tuesday ?

Is there no greater likelihood of it being the bloody work of the LTTE ?

Not so for our great prophet of inevitable war if Mahinda Rajapakse supported by the JVP and JHU wins the Presidential Election.

It's a happy situation of self-fulfilling political prophecies coming true ?

Roadmap to separation

Wickremesinghe actually states the LTTE which not so long ago agreed for an internal administration is now insisting on a separate state. When did the LTTE ever agree to a simple "internal agreement" as he now says it did ?

What it demanded from the UNP Government, after breaking off the talks that Prabhakaran admits were a tactical ploy, was for an Internal Self-Governing Authority, about which there is general agreement it was the perfect blueprint for a separate state of Eelam.

If only Wickremesinghe pauses to ponder for a while he must realise that the LTTE has never given up its goal of a separate state, as much as it has never given up terrorism and widespread violence to achieve it.

What Wickremesinghe hides from the people to destabilise this government, thriving on fear among the people, is that the current tragic situation in the country steps directly from the Ceasefire Agreement that he alone signed with the LTTE.

Apart from demarcating a separate area as being LTTE controlled it also permitted LTTE cadres to move freely in Government controlled areas, while prohibiting the reverse. No wonder the LTTE is able to attack the Security Forces at will, also terrorising the Tamil people, because its cadres had all the opportunity to prepare for terror at will.

It is despite all this that the UNP propaganda machine promoted him as being against division of the country, when in fact he had laid the path to division through terror.

Strangely enough, Wickremesinghe wallowing in his glee over the present situation wants the President to spell out his peace policy. All the UNP leader has to do is to read, Mahinda Chintana even for the first time, and also read the Statement of Policy by the President at the opening of Parliament.

Rajapakse has declared very clearly that he is a not a man of war and is dedicated to peace. He wants talks with the LTTE. He wants the badly flawed CFA amended. But most of all he wants a peace with honour to all citizens of this country. What else does Ranil want to know about the President's peace policy ?

It is best that he give ear to what the President says and comes to a realistic assessment of the "peace with honour" the President wants and also begins to admit the terrorism of the LTTE, instead of making excuses for it.

As much as Ranil was ready to join hands with the SLFP if he won, it is now the time to be realistic in defeat and support the new President in his search for a true peace we have not had for so long. Not all his jeremiads about war will bring the people any closer to him.