For the first time since taking office over two years ago, Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Friday met leaders of the TNA, the country's most prominent Tamil political grouping, officials said.
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) and Rajapaksa have failed to meet for talks since Rajapaksa assumed office in November 2019.
A group of TNA Parliamentarians last month staged a protest in front of the Presidential Secretariat demanding to meet the President and discuss the issues faced by the Tamil people in the north and east of the island nation.
The TNA had asked for a meeting with Rajapaksa several times ever since he was elected in November 2019. At least on two occasions, the meeting had been cancelled at the last minute without any reason, the Tamil leaders had charged at the protest.
The TNA wants the 13th Amendment to the Constitution to be made "meaningful" to address the political concerns of the Tamil minority. The 13th Amendment was the result of the Indo-Lanka Accord of 1987, inked by the then Sri Lankan President JR Jayawardena and Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. It provides for devolution of powers to the minority Tamil community in Sri Lanka.
India has continually reaffirmed its commitment to protect the rights of Sri Lanka's Tamil community through the full implementation of the 13th Amendment, early convening of Provincial Council elections and achieving reconciliation.
However, the LTTE, who led a three-decade-long armed campaign for a separate Tamil homeland, rejected the 13th Amendment, saying it offered too little in the form of power sharing to meet Tamil aspirations for self-determination.
Presently, the ruling Sri Lanka People's Party's Sinhala majority hardliners have been advocating for a total abolition of the island's Provincial Council system. On Thursday, TNA's main spokesman M A Sumanthiran said the alliance was planning to center talks with Rajapaksa on the possibility of making the thirteenth amendment more "meaningful". "We want the Governor's control over the Chief Minister to end," Sumanthiran said. Details on the talks on Friday are yet to be made public as they are still ongoing.
The elections for the nine provinces have been stalled since 2018. The provincial elections to provinces were held up due to a legal snag involving the Delimitation Commission report.
India has been continuously pressing for the holding of provincial councils. Sumanthiran said the TNA was willing to help Sri Lanka out of its current foreign reserve crisis by getting investment from the Tamil diaspora.
Sri Lankan is in the midst of a severe foreign exchange crisis, with costs of imports going through the roof – hurting fuel costs, farm produce and the education sector. Powercuts as long as five hours have become common in major cities. The diaspora has more resources than the Sri Lankan government but they can only come in after 13A is fully implemented," Sumanthiran said. The 13A has introduced a provincial administration system in each of the country's nine provinces. The TNA won by a landslide margin at the first-ever provincial council election held in 2013 in Northern Province.
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