Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam:
All clothes and no emperor
Prof Sisira PINNAWALA
V Rudrakumaran
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Selvarasa Pathmanathan, better known as KP proclaimed himself LTTE
leader after Tiger supremo Prabakaran’s demise. KP chose Visuvanathan
Rudrakumaran, a US based lawyer who was one time legal adviser to the
LTTE negotiating team with the Government and later its unofficial
ideologue after Anton Balasingham’s death, to explore the ways and means
of forming a Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam. After the
extraordinary rendition of Pathmanathan by the Government the unofficial
mantel of leadership of the LTTE and the responsibility of forming the
TGTE fell into the hands of Rudrakumaran. He authored the initial
concept paper for the Provisional Transnational Government of Tamil
Eelam (PGTGE) which was further developed by a 14 member Advisory
Committee consisting of representatives of the Diaspora and some
prominent LTTE sympathizers of the International non-governmental sector
that included Karen Parker, Professors Francis Boyle and Peter Schalk.
The Advisory Committee report entitled Formation of a Provisional
Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (PGTGE) and detailing its
objectives, form and functions was launched on March 15, 2010.
Lack of political space
The Report justifies the formation of transnational government on the
grounds that there is no political space for the Tamil minority in Sri
Lanka to engage in a constructive political dialogue. It also presents
theoretical justification of this project arguing that transnational
links are a crucial force in contemporary politics and international
relations which besides integrating markets, has also brought about the
possibility of organization of political and social movements on a
global scale. It further argues the Tamil Diaspora already has a well
established and highly political transnational network and therefore it
is natural for the Diaspora to take their transnational political
mobilizations to another level, i.e. formation of a transnational
Government.
The Report gives a detailed account of the electoral process of the
TGTE and its functions. It sets the TGTE membership to 135 of which 115
are elected representatives and 20 nominated to represent the countries
and communities that cannot have elections for practical reasons. The
TGTE’s core functions are engagement with the international community
and protecting the interests of the Eelam Tamils in the homeland,
meaning the North and East. The elections for the Constituent Assembly
of the TGTE were held between May 2 to 15, 2010 and the Transnational
Government of Tamil Eelam held its inaugural sessions in three cities in
two continents, Philadelphia in the US and Geneva and London in Europe,
from May 17 to 19, which incidentally is the LTTE leader’s first death
anniversary.
Lack of Government in the TGTE
Civilians awaiting a secure future sans mere dreams. File photo |
The objectives are many but they all boiled down to realizing the
goal of statehood for Tamils in Sri Lanka.
The principal means of achieving these objectives, which is
international engagement on the basis of Tamil nationhood, tells us what
the TGTE is trying to do, is not new.
This is what the Tamil Diaspora organizations have been doing and
failed. What is different in the new venture is that the leadership is
forming a new apex body to control the Diaspora and trying to give it
legitimacy by adopting an electoral process and get recognition on a
different plane by calling it transnational government. The problem
however, is that having a constitution, establishing structures with
grandiose names like Constituent Assemblies and assigning government
like functions to them do not make an organization a government. It will
need to be able to function as a government within the State system.
This is where the idea of a transnational government becomes hollow. The
TGTE is transnational alright but there is certainly no government in
it.
Government can be broadly defined as the agency through which a
political unit exercises its power over its subjects and operates
effectively within the state system which should recognize it has the
authority in exercising this power. Government therefore is the
political body that controls instruments of power in a polity within
accepted norms of conduct of the State system. In abstract sense power
of Government comes from its subjects, namely the people it claims to
represent and by being recognized in the State system. The status of the
TGTE is problematic here as it has no clear source of power and has no
means of exercising authority over the people it claims to represent.
The Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam claims to represent the
Tamils in the homeland but they do not elect it. Instead they are
represented by a proxy which is the Diaspora that elects the Constituent
Assembly of the TGTE.
No authority over Tamils
Not only the TGTE does not derive power from Tamils in the homeland
which it claims to represent but also it does not have any authority
over them. This is because the TGTE neither has access to the homeland
to exercise its authority directly controlling their destiny nor has
recognition in the State system to make any claim or have indirect
impact on the life of its subjects (This is the case of a Government in
exile) who are Tamils in the homeland. The first is a practical problem
the TGTE will not able to do anything about as the Government of Sri
Lanka will not allow its access to the homeland. This will mean that
TGTE will be a government without the ability to govern its subjects.
The sponsors of the TGTE are aware of this fact but maintain that there
is a Government by claiming it a novel experience. The TGTE is novel
alright but in the sense that it is a novel way of glossing over the
hollowness of the whole exercise.
It is not only an entity that has no recognition in the State system
but also operates outside of it. The parallel that the promoters of the
TGTE are trying to draw between the European Union and the Transnational
Government of Tamil Eelam, albeit implicitly, to show the world that
their attempt makes sense, is not valid. It is true that EU is a
transnational operation but its power and authority comes from its
constituent states being part of the State system first and having
recognition as such.
Not only that the TGTE lacks recognition by the State system but also
if the proposers of the concept say is anything to go by the TGTE cannot
expect any such recognition to come even in the future. The Report
giving its reasons for opting to establish the TGTE instead of a
Government in exile says that reason for not forming the latter is
because foreign governments already recognize Sri Lankan Government.
What his means is that for the TGTE to receive recognition by the
State system as a Government on par with other governments the
international community has to de-recognize Sri Lankan Government first.
This in other words means that the TGTE has no hope of being recognized.
Its international engagement then becomes no more than that of a non
governmental organization which in fact it is. This makes the
Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam all clothes and no emperor. To
be continued
The writer is attached to Sociology Department of
Peradeniya University
[email protected] |