The Gospel according to Wijeweera

Is the JVP covertly pushing for Eelam?

By Sonali Samarasinghe

Retired Major General Wasantha Perera giving evidence in court against JVP Propaganda Secretary Wimal Weerawansa in a defamation case last week was to allege the JVP had worked closely with the LTTE during the 1988-1989 period. Not only that, the retired General also accused the JVP of obtaining arms from the Tigers via the Hambantota District.

In fact, Major General Perera revealed, he had compiled at the time an extensive report detailing the close terrorist connection between the JVP and the LTTE during the 1988-1989 period and how the JVP had obtained arms from the LTTE. Recall that JVP violence killed thousands of civilians and security forces and police personnel in the space of two years. 

JVP-LTTE links

Meanwhile Major General Perera also charged that the JVP was involved in many unlawful activities including killings and that he as the Coordinator and the Commander of the Galle District had been able to foil the JVP arms deals with the LTTE via Hambantota during that period. 

That the JVP has close ties with the LTTE and the two organisations during their most violent periods shared a common socialist thinking, one knows well.

Perhaps however what has been forgotten is how deeply this thinking penetrated the JVP psyche.

Wijeweera expounds

In his monumental 1985 work largely regarded as the Bible of Communism in Sri Lanka, Rohana Wijeweera was to strenuously argue a case in favour of self determination for the Tamils. The report titled in Sinhala, Demala Eelam Aragalayata Visaduma Kumakda? (What is the solution to Tamil Eelam struggle?), was presented to the JVP central committee by Wijeweera on April 15, 1986.

It was to become the bedrock of the JVP's political future. Wijeweera was a consummate political prestidigitator and interwoven into JVP policies was to be an element of legerdemain absolutely necessary to their survival as a political force.

The JVP leadership has been thus able to adroitly adopt a secret two pronged approach. One for public consumption and another for private practice and future reference and implementation. 

A JVP publication following the 1977 general election titled The National Question And The Constitution Of Sri Lanka is described as a comparative study by the JVP of the Constitutions of 1972 and 1978 as they affect the Tamil speaking people of Sri Lanka and said thus: 

"If one nation oppresses another, that oppressor is oppressed. The proletariat, in the struggle against oppression, must always acknowledge this observation. Marxist - Leninists within the oppressed nation must fight for the right of the oppressed nation, even to the extent of a separate political existence. Not to do so will be tantamount to being a racialist."

"The existing state in Sri Lanka today is a multi-nation state, made up of people who speak Sinhala and Tamil, who are transforming themselves from nationalities to a Lankan nation. The decision as to whether they are to live together with the Sinhala speaking or separately from them namely, whether they are to form one state or two separate states is entirely in the hands of the Tamil speaking people of this country. This is what the JVP means when it says that it accepts the right of the Tamil speaking people to self determination."

Official stance

The JVP leaflet Niyamuwa published articles supporting the right of self determination for Tamil people in its editions of May 1983 and June 1983. A year later just days after Black July the JVP was proscribed by the UNP government in power on July 30, 1983. President J.R. Jayewardene dumped the blame on the JVP for inciting the anti-Tamil riots.

Meanwhile the JVP could not be more relieved. While secretly and internally propagating Leninist principles of self determination for the Tamil community it decided to publicly take a hard line against the Tamil struggle. It went overboard in accusing governments of complicity with the Tamil separatists and its propaganda became increasingly more violent and anti Eelam as time wore on.

By adopting a Sinhala Buddhist majoritarian rhetoric the JVP found resonance not only with the thinking of the working classes but also with the upper class racist elements - the politically and financially powerful Colombo elite.

For the JVP the capture of political power is its ultimate goal. However their options are limited given the political scenario and the grip on power by the two main political parties. A division of the country and an area of self determination for the Tamil community as envisaged by Rohana Wijeweera will enable them to capture the seat of power in the south.

The history of the JVP shows that it has opposed any attempt by any government to compromise with the Tamil terrorists or to reach a political solution. In 1986 it whipped up a frenzy over an alleged conspiracy by the Rajiv-JR-Pirapaharan troika to 'divide the country.'

But when the IPKF came to Sri Lanka following the Indo-Lanka Accord, and the LTTE was faced with extinction, it was the JVP that came to their rescue by unleashing mayhem in the country, calling for the IPKF's eviction.

President Ranasinghe Premadasa was eventually forced to ask the IPKF to leave giving the LTTE a fresh lease of life.

'UNP-LTTE conspiracy'

In 2002 with the signing of the Ceasefire Agreement it became obvious that a settlement to the conflict would perhaps forever shut the door on a Tamil separatist state. The Ranil Wickremesinghe government had cornered the LTTE and set in place an international safety net. The then government had also succeeded in fracturing the LTTE by precipitating the Karuna defection.

Pirapaharan knew full well that a Wickremesinghe government would achieve through strategy what a Rajapakse government could never achieve through war. Pirapaharan was to later call Wickremesinghe a 'cunning fox not to be trusted.'

It was again the JVP that came to the rescue of the LTTE by carrying out a propaganda  campaign against the UNP government, the peace process and the CFA.

Firm grip

The JVP now has a firm grip of the Rajapakse government. Using its 38 member power in parliament it is forcing the hand of the government to pursue a military course of action. During the Budget crisis of December the JVP was able to twist President Mahinda Rajapakse's arm into agreeing to several disastrous conditions. One was the abrogation of the CFA that alarmed the world community and this was soon followed by the eviction of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission. 

The JVP is now calling stridently for the banning of the LTTE as a terrorist organization in Sri Lanka. Already US Ambassador Robert Blake has warned that any move to ban the LTTE in Sri Lanka might be interpreted by the international community as taking a further step away from any kind of a political solution.

 Therefore by forcing the government's hand on the ethnic issue, is the JVP merely hastening the country towards separation is the question, thereby enabling them to control the south leaving the LTTE the north and east.

Is the JVP facilitating Eelam through dubious means while playing to the Sinhala gallery in order to win the hearts and minds of the majority? Showcasing itself as a saviour to the nation from corrupt mainstream governments by pandering to the Sinhalese, is it by insidious means attempting a break up of the country as propounded by Wijeweera?

The JVP knows it cannot capture power in the country especially under the presidential system as long as the north and east remain part of Sri Lanka and therefore it suits their designs to precipitate a division which will pave the way for them to form a government in the south. 

By forcing the Rajapakse regime into a military hardline bind and isolating the government from the international community is the JVP pushing Sri Lanka towards a Kosovo like situation in keeping with the ideology of Rohana Wijeweera?

As the JVP isolates Sri Lanka from the world it is significant to note that the Unilateral Declaration of Independence by Kosovo was endorsed by the United States of America and powerful EU countries including Britain, Germany and France.

It is also significant to note that international endorsement came despite the fact that the current leader of Kosovo is a former leader of the separatist army - the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and was earlier branded a terrorist. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia had even carried out investigations concerning the leadership of the disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army and its involvement in war crimes during the Kosovo conflict of 1998-1999.

The JVP has proven a treacherous political force in the past. While supporting the separatist struggle of the LTTE in order to gain power in the south and achieve their narrow, self seeking political ends, the extremists also must nurse its constituency and pander to the complexes that plague the Sinhala majority.

This JVP strategy begs the question whether it is trying to achieve what Wijeweera failed  by direct talk through a Machiavellian ploy? Given the evidence of Major General Wasantha Perera  it appears there is room for much more than mere suspicion.