US embassy cable - 05COLOMBO1128

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 COLOMBO 001128 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SA/INS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/26/2015 
TAGS: PGOV, PTER, CE, LTTE - Peace Process, Political Parties, Tsunami 
SUBJECT: SRI LANKA:  COALITION CRACKING, CHAUVINISTS 
LITIGATING OVER JOINT MECHANISM 
 
REF: COLOMBO 1116 
 
Classified By: DCM JAMES F. ENTWISTLE.  REASON:  1.4 (B,D). 
 
------- 
SUMMARY 
-------- 
 
1.  (C)  Three days after the Government signed an agreement 
to coordinate tsunami aid with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil 
Eelam (LTTE), opposition to the Post-Tsunami Operational 
Management Structure (P-TOMS), also known as the "joint 
mechanism," among President Chandrika Kumaratunga's political 
allies is broadening.  Following the departure of the Janatha 
Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) from the United People's Freedom 
Alliance (UPFA) on June 16, smaller coalition members New 
Unity Alliance (NUA) and Mahajana Eksath Peramuna (MEP) are 
also contemplating quitting.  On June 27 Muslim MPs from NUA 
and the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) staged a one-day 
general strike in Muslim areas of the eastern district of 
Ampara to protest the P-TOMS' perceived neglect of Muslim 
interests.  Sinhalese nationalist parties, on the other hand, 
like the JVP and the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), are 
preparing to challenge the P-TOMS in court.  The JHU is also 
considering an impeachment motion against the President on 
the grounds of "mental infirmity" and treason, among others. 
While JVP/JHU opposition is no surprise, the rare consensus 
among Muslim parties against the agreement could undermine 
GSL efforts to depict the P-TOMS as primarily intended to 
help the tsunami-affected of all communities.   End summary. 
 
---------------------- 
UPFA COALITION: 
CRACKING AT THE SEAMS 
---------------------- 
 
2.  (U) A mere three days after the Government signed the 
controversial Post-Tsunami Operational Management Structure 
(P-TOMS) agreement, also known as the "joint mechanism," with 
the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on June 24 
(Reftel), opposition to the agreement, including among 
President Chandrika Kumaratunga's coalition partners, is 
growing increasingly vociferous.  In addition to the 
Sinhalese nationalist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), which 
left the United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA) on June 16 
to protest the mechanism, two smaller members of the alliance 
are also contemplating quitting.  Although the New Unity 
Alliance (NUA) and the Mahajana Eksath Peramuna (MEP) only 
command a meager four seats in the Parliament, the symbolic 
impact of their leaving--and the damage done to the UPFA's 
claims to represent a broad cross-section of Sri Lankan 
society--could be substantial.  (NUA's constituents are 
largely Eastern Muslims; MEP's are Sinhalese Buddhists with a 
similar ideology to the JVP's.)  Moreover, the parties' two 
leaders each head ministries crucial to tsunami 
reconstruction efforts (NUA's Ferial Ashraff is Minister of 
Housing, while MEP's Dinesh Gunawardena holds the Urban 
Development portfolio).  MEP Leader Gunawardena told the 
press that the party will decide by the evening of June 27 
whether to remain in the alliance. 
 
-------------------------------- 
MUSLIMS:  UNITED IN OPPOSITION? 
-------------------------------- 
 
3.  (SBU) With its support base in the tsunami-ravaged 
districts of Ampara and Batticaloa, NUA's threatened 
defection could prove particularly damaging to the GSL's bid 
to portray the P-TOMS as an effort to ensure the equitable 
distribution to tsunami-affected populations of all ethnic 
communities.  Both NUA and the SLMC have criticized the 
P-TOMS as neglecting Muslim interests, citing in particular 
the disproportionate representation given to the LTTE at the 
regional level (five LTTE to three Muslims and two GSL), even 
though Muslims comprise the community most heavily affected 
by the tsunami, and the location of the regional committee in 
Kilinochchi.  Muslim leaders have also complained that they 
were not consulted during the drafting and negotiation of the 
text.  On June 26 NUA Deputy Leader M.L.A.M. Hisbulla 
resigned from his post as Chairman of Port and Air Services, 
citing opposition to the P-TOMS, and challenged NUA Leader 
Ashraff to decide within 48 hours whether she would follow 
suit.  Hisbulla, who heads the NUA District Committee in 
Batticaloa, complained publicly that under the P-TOMS Muslim 
tsunami victims from Batticaloa would have to travel to LTTE 
 
SIPDIS 
headquarters in Kilinochchi to pursue relief requests.   As 
of COB June 27, Ashraff had not announced her decision. 
 
4.  (SBU) On June 27 the Muslim Federation of Mosques in 
Ampara, called a one-day general strike, or "hartal," in the 
eastern coastal district to protest the P-TOMS, closing shops 
and shutting down public transportation in Muslim areas. 
(Note:  Ampara town, which is predominantly Sinhalese, was 
unaffected by the strike.  End note.)  Muslim MPs from the 
SLMC and NUA traveled to Ampara to participate in the strike. 
 According to police sources and local residents, roads 
leading to and within the Muslim coastal areas of Kalmunai 
and Akkaraipattu were barricaded with burning tires in the 
early morning, but security forces succeeded in clearing all 
obstructions by about noon.  There were no reports of 
violence in the area as of COB June 27. 
 
5.  (C)  In a June 27 meeting with poloff, Nimalan 
Karthikeyan, a pro-LTTE member of the National Peace Council, 
said that the Muslims' main grievance is that they had not 
been adequately consulted.  Karthikeyan claimed that the LTTE 
had been particularly scrupulous in safeguarding Muslim 
interests during the P-TOMS drafting/negotiation process, 
insinuating that, were it not for the Tigers, the Muslims 
might have been left with no representation at all. 
(Comment:  We are skeptical of the accuracy of this account.) 
 Now that the deal is signed, Colombo politicos, rather than 
Muslims in the field, are raising the main objections, he 
asserted.  The LTTE maintains excellent relations at the 
grassroots level with the Federation of Mosques in the east; 
Colombo politicians' jealousy of those ties may be partly 
behind their opposition to the joint mechanism now, he 
suggested.  When poloff observed that the Federation of 
Mosques was now spearheading an anti-P-TOMS hartal, 
Karthikeyan again blamed Colombo politics and personal 
rivalries for impelling the protest. 
 
----------------------- 
JVP:  SLOGANEERING AND 
LITIGATING 
----------------------- 
 
6.  (U) On June 26 JVP leaders held a press conference in 
Colombo to explain (again) the party's opposition to the 
agreement.  JVP Leader Somawansa Amarasinghe demanded that 
the Government of Sri Lanka (GSL) table the document in 
Parliament (neglecting to mention, as reported reftel, that 
when the GSL attempted to do just that on June 24 his MPs' 
disruptive behavior caused the session to be adjourned). 
Amarasinghe stressed that JVP opposition to the P-TOMS would 
form the crux of any future election campaign--whether for 
Parliament or the presidency--and invited all "progressives" 
and "patriots" to join hands with the former Marxists in this 
endeavor.   He added that the JVP planned to contest the 
legality of the P-TOMS in court.  True to Amarasinghe's word, 
on June 27 JVP MP and former Deputy Minister of Small 
Industries Sunil Handunetti filed a fundamental rights case 
with the Supreme Court, alleging that the P-TOMS infringes 
upon his civil rights. 
 
--------------------------- 
JHU TO ACCUSE PRESIDENT OF 
TREASON, MENTAL INFIRMITY 
--------------------------- 
 
7.  (C)  The JHU, meanwhile, is contemplating its own 
challenges to the P-TOMS.  JHU Administrative Secretary Udaya 
Gammanapila told us on June 27 that the party plans to take 
legal action against River Basin Development Minister and 
Leader of the House Maithripala Sirisena (for trying to table 
the agreement in Parliament on June 24) and Rehabilitation 
Secretary M.S. Jayasinghe (for signing the agreement on 
 
SIPDIS 
behalf of the GSL).  Gammanapila said the JHU will ask the 
Court to annul the civic rights of the pair on the grounds 
that they had promoted the separation of the country through 
their actions.  (Note:  Under the Sixth Amendment to the 
Constitution, "No person shall, directly or indirectly, in or 
outside Sri Lanka, support, espouse, promote, finance, 
encourage or advocate the establishment of a separate state 
within the territory of Sri Lanka."  Anyone convicted of so 
doing is subject to asset forfeiture, forfeiture of public 
office, and the loss of his civic rights for up to seven 
years.  Civic rights include the right to hold public office, 
vote, own property and hold a passport.)  Constitutional 
lawyer Saliya Peiris, however, told us in a separate 
conversation that the JHU would be unable to follow through 
on this plan since Sixth Amendment cases can only be filed by 
the Attorney General.  He speculated that the JHU would 
follow the JVP's lead in filing a fundamental rights case 
against the P-TOMS instead. 
 
8.  (C)  Gammanapila also declared that the JHU plans to file 
an impeachment motion against President Kumaratunga on 
various grounds, including "mental infirmity," treason, 
violation of the Constitution and misappropriation of 
presidential powers.  He said that the JHU has already 
submitted to a group of psychiatrists in the UK a collection 
of speeches made by the President on different occasions and 
asked the doctors to analyze her mental stability.  In 
addition, he reported, members of the Buddhist clergy will 
urge the four chief prelates, or "Mahanayakes," to issue an 
edict calling all Buddhist monks and laity to converge on 
Kandy on July 1 for an anti-PTOMS protest. 
 
-------------------------- 
UNP SUPPORTS IN PRINCIPLE; 
NOTES CONCERNS 
-------------------------- 
 
9.  (U) On June 27 United National Party (UNP) Spokesman G.L. 
Peiris held a press conference to announce that the main 
opposition party supports in principle the establishment of 
the P-TOMS insofar as the agreement provides humanitarian aid 
to the tsunami-affected and operates within the parameters 
set out in the Oslo Communique and the Tokyo Declaration. 
That said, Peiris went on to note several perceived flaws in 
the agreement, citing in particular the lack of adequate 
representation for the Muslim community and the failure to 
stipulate clear provision for representation of the Sinhala 
community. 
 
-------- 
COMMENT 
-------- 
 
10.  (C) Part of the reason Muslim concerns are so often 
ignored in domestic political discourse is because the 
community itself is deeply divided--largely along the fault 
lines of the rival political ambitions of various leaders. 
Like the JVP, these splintered parties may now find a 
rallying cry--and a defining election platform--in opposition 
to the joint mechanism.  While the JVP decision to quit the 
alliance over the P-TOMS may have been no surprise--and, in 
some ways, possibly a welcome relief for the embattled 
President--the threatened defection of NUA is another matter. 
 The GSL has tried to sell the P-TOMS to the Sri Lankan 
public as a humanitarian agreement ensuring the equitable 
distribution of tsunami aid to all ethnic groups.  A NUA 
walk-out over alleged neglect of Muslim interests would 
clearly undercut these efforts. 
LUNSTEAD