M A S MASTER OF THE INANE

M. A. Sumanthiran, TNA MP recently made a tub-thumping speech in Parliament when he was in fact on the subject of a no-confidence motion against Minister Dilan Perera. The speech had nothing to do with Rizana Nafeeq or the dangers that Sri Lankan migrant workers are subject to in the Middle East.

By some contortion of logic, Sumanthiran thought it fit that he could use the time allocated for the no-confidence motion to speak on the subject of ‘genocide’ of Tamils in the Northern Province.

Sumanthiran bandied about the word genocide as if he had pulled it the other day from a magician’s hat. Said he that the acquisition of around 6,000 acres of land in the Northern Province for security purposes was an act of genocide against the Tamil people, as Tamil people had been exclusively picked for the purpose of mass ejection, for the stated purpose of establishing an Army cantonment.

Sumanthiran then went onto make the extraordinary claim that Sinhalese people had not been similarly ejected en masse anywhere -- forgetting that when people’s lands are acquired in Sinhala majority areas for various purposes, its the Sinhala community that gets ejected in their thousands.

In other words, land acquisition and relocation of people for public or security related purposes is community-blind, and say for instance the people relocated during the construction of the Southern Highway for instance were exclusively Sinhalese. Going by the brilliant Sumanthiran logic, the authorities have therefore recently been carrying out a genocide against the Sinhala people as well!

The majority of Sinhala people ejected from lands and relocated as a result of the various construction projects in the last year for example far exceed the number of families whose lands were taken over as a result of the recent acquisitions in the Northern Province. The demographics in the Northern Province stand the same and they will be the same despite the fact that a relatively small number of families have been relocated, but this still does not stop Sumanthiran from uttering -- in Parliament -- the ridiculous claim of genocide.

This is very much on the lines of the Tiger rump’s usage of holocaust terminology for alleged wartime ‘atrocities’ against Tamils, and the use of the Hitler salute once upon a time by Prabhakaran’s cadres to deify and ‘honour the now safely dead and buried ‘Supremo.’ These people went so much over the top that they totally alienated the powerful Jewish lobbies in Western capitals that do not take kindly to the misuse of holocaust terminology as they consider the genocide of the Jews an act that was in a class by itself in terms of hate directed against a single race.

But Sumanthiran seems determined to be ever the ignoramus in this over the top Tamil Tiger tradition, and it does not come as a surprise from this man who sits at the same table with terrorists at worst and terrorists apologists at best, such as Rudrakumaran and Fr. Emmanuel. It is also no secret that Sumanthiran harbours great hopes for a TNA victory at the upcoming Northern Provincial Council polls.

Some politician this, who goes about bragging that the TNA will win -- while claiming that there is genocide against the Tamil people in the same Northern Province where he hopes to win an election. A population under the gun and under threat of persecution – genocide -- electing some of their own as their own representatives, now that’s some genocide, unless Sumanthiran has given new meaning to the G-word.

The callowness of Sumanthiran as a politician sadly becomes more apparent by the day. He seems to have the same affliction that Tissa Jayatilleke does when the latter predicts that this nation is on the brink of calamity. Both seem to think that a supercilious swagger is a good substitute for sound logic, intellectual rigour and truthfulness. But, walking the walk certainly is not the same as talking the talk, to put it in an argot that shouldn’t be too complicated for the small minded to get around their rather inconsiderable craniums.