Incidents such as the recent arrest of four individuals commemorating the Mullivaikkal war dead will deter the Tamil population from voting for any majority candidate in the upcoming Presidential Election, opined the Thamil Makkal Thesiya Kuttani (TMTK) Leader and Opposition Parliamentarian C.V. Wigneswaran.
Four persons including three women and a man were arrested by the Sampur Police recently for allegedly violating a Court order by commemorating the Mullivaikkal war dead. The arrestees are alleged to have distributed porridge to their neighbours in memory of their relatives who were lost to the conflict. The suspects were produced before the Muttur Magistrate’s Court, after which they were remanded until 27 May.
Speaking to The Daily Morning, Wigneswaran claimed that the arrests in question have been made with some political motive, and that some party will benefit from it. "Even in the worst of times, when the relationship between the people and the Army was very bad, we were able to have peaceful commemorations. I, as the Northern Provincial Chief Minister at that time, went to Mullivaikkal, made speeches and came back. It all went fine. If it is the way that things happened years ago, why can’t the people commemorate their relatives now? There is some political motive behind these arrests and someone is trying to benefit out of it."
He further said that the continuation of incidents such as barring the people from peacefully commemorating their relatives will lead towards disadvantageous situations for the majority based candidates who would contest the upcoming Presidential Election. "If this is the way that they (majority based leaders) treat the Tamil people, they are sadly mistaken. What will happen is that all Tamils will boycott all majority based candidates in the Presidential Election. They will anyway vote for the Tamil candidate, but, even the chance of them (Tamil people) casting their preferential vote to majority based candidates will go away due to these incidents."
Mullivaikkal war dead commemorations are organised by Sri Lankan Tamil people to remember those who died in the final stages of the Sri Lankan internal conflict. Such commemorations have however been dealt harshly by the Sri Lankan law enforcement agencies and defence establishment. Over the past, several Tamil politicians and citizens have been arrested for commemorating the Mullivaikkal Remembrance Day.