By V. Anandasangaree –

V. Anandasangaree

Hon. R. Sampanthan (MP)

Leader of the opposition

Colombo.

My dear Sam,

Let the world know the truths

Seven years had passed since the war came to an end. The government that was formed with your support has functioned for over 20 months now. The tussle between the government and the people over their lands is continuing. The first village that was formed in Killinochchi is Paravipanjan, which is the most important settlement in the Killinochchi town area.

It is now under the control of the army which is using it as the Head Quarters of a division of the Sri Lankan Army. In the midst of this confused situation, apart from the sufferings, difficulties and losses sustained by the people, the government is now preparing to take over 617 acres of private lands belonging to the people of Mullivaikkal in the Mullaitivu district. The land is to be surveyed shortly. In this situation I wish to ask you as to what you have achieved for the suffering victims of war. I would have called for the unity of the Tamil people more than ten times during the last few years but upto now you have not taken any step towards it. I did not do any wrong to our people. I am the one who challenged the Defense Minister in Parliament one day that he will never recapture Elephant pass. That is the truth. But you have said that I wanted Elephant pass to be returned to the forces. That was a deliberate lie which made me to lose even the Local elections that I contested, for which the credit goes to both you and Senathirajah. If only Mr. A.Vinayagamoorthy M.P will confirm what you said, I am prepared even now to quit politics. All these are old stories. The credit for depriving our people of my services for well over 12 years also go to you and Mr. Senathirajah. I remained silent these 12 years because by my interference the peace process should not get disturbed. I can’t remain silence any more. Under compelling circumstances I have to come out with what happened in the past without hiding anything. This is the first in the series of letters that I propose to write to you.

From the time you broke away from the Tamil United Liberation Front, I had written to you a number of letters without receiving a single reply for any of them. However I refrained from dealing with sensitive issues for the main reason that, my actions should not go detrimental to the interest of the TULF’s policies.

You are not unaware of the fact that History is a country’s record of past events, social, political and economical, in order of time. It is the history of its great individuals and also records of all varieties of events. I accuse you of destroying the history of the TULF which itself is a part of the political history of the country involving great leaders and personalities like the Hon. S.J.V.Chelvanayagam Q.C, Hon.G.G.Ponnambalam Q.C, Hon.S.Thondaman, Hon.A.Amirthalingam, Hon.M.Sivasithamparam and many such others.

You should first know the history of your association with the TULF. When the TULF was inaugurated on the 14th of may 1972, initially the entire membership of the Thamil Arasu Kadchi and the All Ceylon Tamil Congress got merged together, with the blessings of the founder President Hon.S.J.V.Chelvanayagam and Hon.G.G.Ponnambalam. I hope you will remember that I was a founder member of the TULF, joined it from the ACTC. Although you were there at the public meeting held that evening, you did not join the TULF because you were not a member of any one of these two parties. You joined the TULF with your nomination as its candidate at the 1977 General Election, at which 17 of us won and lost only one seat in the East. Your conscience will tell you as to who was responsible for the defeat of one of our candidates at that election.

It is now very clear that you were not a member of the Thamil Arasu Kaddchi formed by the late Hon. S.J.V. Chelvanayagam, till he died on 26-04-1977. With his demise, the ITAK was virtually dead. But to prevent anyone from misusing its name and the symbol ‘HOUSE’ the late Mr.A. Amirthalingam, perhaps the only founder member living at that time, who was active in politics, had the registration of the party ITAK in force. This is confirmed by a statement issued by his wife Mrs. Mangayarkarasi Amirthalingam long before she died, an extract of which is as follow: “It is a pity that some of those who have been groomed by him have attempted to misuse the name of the Federal Party and trying to revive it. They have only breached the Trust he had placed on them. Thus I categorically make it clear to all that I have never approved nor blessed the revival of the Federal Party but instead condemn it as this act is a ploy to destroy the TULF which was formed by our great leaders.” Please note that she refers to our leaders as great leaders.Who are these great leaders who have now revived it, I wish to know.

The Presidentship of the ITAK which you held for some time was not that of the ITAK founded by the late Hon. S.J.V.Chelvanayagam, fondly referred to as ‘Eelaththu Gandhi’ and was strictly committed to Non Violence. The one of which you were President, was founded by Hon.Mavai Senathiraja 26 years after the demise of the original founder Thanthai Chelva. The details of this episode will be given to you in my next letter to you.

Please forget about our differences of opinion and start seriously thinking about our ethnic problem. I am not interested in any positions. I want to see a permanent solution arrived at for the ethnic question. As a first step please drop the TNA garb you are wearing which found a good market among the Diaspora crowed, since many of them were under the impression that the TNA was a creation of the LTTE. But you and I know that we created it on the advice of six leading Tamil civilians namely M/s V.Kailasapillai, Kandiah Neelakandan, V.R.Vadivetkarasan, Nirmalan Kathikeyan, S.Thiyagarajah and K.Jeyabalasingam. It was formed on the 22nd October, 2001 and the signatories to the MoU were M/s. R.Sampathan, Dr. Kumarakurubaran, N.Prasanna and K.Premachandren, in their capacity as secretaries of the TULF the ACTC, the TELO, and the EPRLF respectively. You should feel guilty for betraying the late Mr.Muthulingam by depriving him of the National list Membership of Parliament promised to him after Mr.M.Sivasithambaram. This promise was given to him by the party including you. But even before the funeral pyre of Mr.Sivasithambaram was lit, you rushed to Vanni with another Member of parliament to meet Mr. S.P.Thamilchelvan to have Mr.Muthulingam’s name replaced with the name of Mr.Thurairatnasingam who came next to you in the Trincomalee District. You were very much aware that Mr.Muthulingam was persuaded to stand down in favour of the late Mr.Raviraj who won at that election. Mr. Thurairatnasingam did not have any justifiable reason to have himself nominated to that position. The party should have removed you from your position as secretary general of the party for your wrongful act. Although it is not my concern, I should say that you played this foul game again, detrimental to the unity of the TNA. This does not mean that I approve the existence of the TNA which was a fraudulent combination of parties not constituted in a proper way. But you ignored the other constituent partners of the TNA very often and always continued deliberately to promote the ITAK founded by Mavai Senathiraja by fraudulent means.

The term TNA is now being thoroughly misused and it has lost its credibility. We should not take mean advantage of the popularity the term TNA has unjustly earned among the Tamil people, mistakenly still believing it as one organized by the LTTE. But I am glad that you have openly admitted that the LTTE has nothing to do with the TNA. Let us be fair by our people and not continue to cheat them anymore. Therefore please drop the TNA garb and come to the ring with clean hands and with sincere motives to solve the main problems of the Tamils, the ethnic problem. Please reply.

Thanking you,

Yours

V. Anandasangaree – Secretary General – TULF