SEP explains its perspective

Socialist Equality Party (SEP) in a letter to the Editor has replied to certain comments made by Malinda Seneviratne in his column Moving Inspection on April 23, 2010. It said:

"In what can only be interpreted as an attempt to incite a terrorist act against the Socialist Equality Party and its leadership, the author of this article, Malinda Seneviratne, wrote: "Someone once said that 99 percent of the Opposition can be purchased and that the remaining one percent must be eliminated, meaning killed". Seneviratna then identifies the SEP, and two of its leading members - Wije Dias (myself) and Nanda Wickremasinghe (Podi Wicks) - as among those who belong to the one percent.

"In language dripping with malice and cynicism, Seneviratna writes: "I choose to salute Podi Wicks and Wije Dias. They are politically honest. Unpurchasable".

"No one will be fooled by the hypocritical encomium proffered by Seneviratna, who cut his political teeth with the forerunners of the extreme right wing Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU).

"This organization is now a partner of the Rajapaksa Government. It will be clear to everyone that Seneviratna's intention is to call the attention of the JHU and other reactionary forces to the activities of the SEP.

"The publication of Seneviratna's article implicates Daily News, a Government-owned newspaper, in Seneviratna's provocative designs.

"To further incite murderous forces within the State apparatus as well as communal gangs against the SEP, Seneviratna describes our organization as "Eelamist". The SEP unequivocally opposed the reactionary war waged by successive Colombo regimes against the Tamil people. But it is well known, within Sri Lanka and internationally, that the SEP opposed the bourgeois separatist program of the LTTE. Our party has fought for the unity of the Sinhala and Tamil people, under the banner of the United Socialist States of Sri Lanka and Eelam.

"This remains the perspective of the SEP. Our struggle for socialism and the democratic rights of all working people will not be deterred by threats of any kind - even those promoted in the pages of Daily News."