Trimming down Mr. T to his size

The reactions of Mr. Saumyamoorthi Thondaman, some government MPs and apologists for the PA, on the defeat of the Votes of the Ministry of Livestock Development and Estate Infrastructure are both comic and ridiculous.

It need not be stressed that it is the responsibility of the governing party to have a sufficient number of members in the Chamber of parliament to have its legislation passed. The role of the Opposition,by tradition, is to oppose. Given the bitter animosity that exists between the PA government and the UNP, only the politically naive would expect the UNP to miss a chance of rubbing the PA nose in the mud of the Diyawanna Oya. The government with its allies has a sufficient majority but when the UNP moved an amendment to the ministry votes of Mr. Thondaman, he refused to budge despite being outnumbered by the Opposition and the votes of his ministry were defeated.

Now, Mr. Thondaman and his fellow CWC MPs as well as some government MPs are accusing the UNP of communalism and voting against the interests of the plantation workers in the hope that it will pay dividends at the forthcoming provincial councils elections..

Mr. Thondaman — Mr. T as he is at times called after the tough character in the TV Series ‘A Team’—must surely be an optimist of the highest order to expect the UNP to be kind to him. Mr. T. having been nominated by the UNP on its national list and his CWC MPs being returned to parliament on the UNP ticket, joins the Chandrika Kumaratunga government after the UNP fails to get the required majority at the polls and becomes a PA minister !

Mr. T has over the years developed the fine art of defining a communalist and democratic liberal to his advantage. Any person who accuses him of communalism he will say is making a mistake because he is only the leader of the plantation workers— a trade union. But this trade union comprises 90 percent Tamils of Indian origin. But, to him, any person who attacks or criticises or goes against CWC interests, is a communalist who wants the poor people of Indian origin enslaved.

That is exactly what happened on the debate on the votes of his ministry. UNP’s Tyronne Fernando moved an amendment that plantation lands that are to be distribute to estate workers got to have the approval of the Cabinet. Mr. T, the Messiah of the Plantation Workers, rejected it outright. He wants to decide on who gets the land. Surely he could have trusted his cabinet colleagues? No. He wants to have his way and had it that way , till the defeat last week.

Mr. T has bulldozed his way in Sri Lanka politics for many decades and is now arrogant enough to say: ‘It is I who will decide whether the UNP or the SLFP will form a government’. To a great extent this is true because of the supine attitude adopted towards him for a long time by both the UNP and SLFP. Because of the decisive marginal vote of the plantation workers, he has been able to exercise this political blackmail at the expense of all other communities in the hill country. It was only at the last Pradeshiya Sabha elections that Mr. T was exposed when the plantation workers by and large supported the UNP and he suffered a humiliating defeat.

Mr. T can froth and fume at the UNP for the defeat of his ministry votes but he is well aware that his overbearing attitude that is being resented in the ranks of the PA was the cause. That accounts for PA members failing to turn up to pass his ministry votes.

Plantation workers are indeed an underprivileged lot who need state assistance just as much as the Kandyan peasantry, whose lands are now being occupied by plantation workers, need such assistance.The estate lands being distributed are not Mr. T’s ancestral properties but the land of the Kandyan peasantry. The cabinet deciding on the beneficiaries of land distribution is by far better than giving Mr. T a carte blanche.

Mr. T. last week at Badulla, had said that he was too old to be taught a lesson. He should realise that older and much more powerful politicians have learnt much bitter lessons having become intolerably arrogant. Being a cabinet minister he has had the audacity to say that the Northern and Eastern provinces be given over to Prabakaran for five years while his government is pursuing a relentless war against Prabakaran and his terrorists.

It is time Mr. T is trimmed down to his size and that is what those in his own ranks have done by letting his ministry votes be defeated.