Provincial elections show strong opposition
SRI LANKA provincial elections was marked by a bizarre incident. The government lifted the ban on the JVP, claiming that a deal had been reached calling for the JVP to surrender its arms. Rohana Wijeweera immediately announced that there had been no agreement, and that the JVP would never negotiate with the "illegal, murderous Jayto government awardene regime."
The Sri Lanka press claimed that the security minister had been deceived by an adventurer falsely claiming to represent
THE RESULTS of the second series of provincial elections held in the Sri Lanka on June 3 were similar to those held on
April 28. The level of participation was about 60 per cent in both votes. The ruling UNP got an absolute majority in all the provincial councils, but there was a very large vote for the four-party United Socialist Alliance (USA), the UNP's only challenger, Since the second major bourgeois party, the Sri
Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the Sinhalese nationalist group, the JVP, boycotted the elections.
These elections have been seen to some extent as a referendum on the Indo-Sri Lanka Peace Accord, since all the participating parties support the accord, while the SLFP and the JVP oppose it. The provincial elections are in fact a result of the Indo-Sri Lanka accord, which calls for devolved government as a means of giving administrative autonomy to the Tamil-majority areas.
GERRY FOLEY
HE ABSTENTION rate in the
T
June 3 elections was highest in the western province, with only
53% of voters taking part. In the central province, 62% of voters went to the polls. The UNP got only 52 seats out of
102, a bare majority in the wester province, and 35 out of 56 in the central one. In the western province, the USA got 42 seats and the Muslim got 6 seats and the Liberal
Party, two. Inevitably, the elections are being seen as a referendum on the Sri-Lanka peace accord.
However, there was another important factor. These were the first elections in eleven years in Sri Lanka, the first opportunity for voting against the UNP govemment. The SLFP is claiming that many people who would normally vote for it voted for the USA in order to show their disapproval of the UNP government.
Ruling party claimed boycott was ignored
On the other hand, the government party is claiming that the fact that a majority voted, despite the SLFP's boycott call and a campaign of terror by the JVP (according to the London Financial Times of May 11,
23 UNP and USA candidates were assassinated before the April 28 elections), showed that the SLFP has been repudiated.
But there are historical analogies indicating that when a major party boycotts elections, their legitimacy is dubious and that that can rebound against all the participating parties. That was the experience of the elections in the Irish Free State in the period following the Irish civil war, when the republicans did not participate. It was also the experience of the "Infamous Decade" in Argentina in the 1930s, when the Radicals did not participate. In both cases, the only opposition was the parliamentary left, whose collaboration led subsequently to historic setbacks. India announces reduction of troops
In the April 28 elections in the north central province, the north-west, Uva and Sabaragamuwa, the UNP got a total of 88 seats as opposed to 64 for the USA. The Muslim Congress got three. In the UNP's traditional bastion of Sabaragamuwa, it barely scraped through with a majority, with 22 seats to 20 for the USA. The ruling party was able to point, however, to some districts where the rate of participation was high.
The period between the two series of the JVP. But the incident does seem, at the very least, to show that the government was anxious to offer a hand of reconciliation to an organization that has claimed responsibility for many assassinations.
The second series of provincial elections also coincided with the Indian government's announcement of its first reduction of its Peacekeeping Force in Sri Lanka. However, it has not specified the number of troops that it intends to withdraw. At present, the Indian forces number about 52,000, substantially more than the Sri Lankan army. This is about the same number of troops as Britain had at the height of the conflict in Northern Ireland, an area with a population similar to that of the Tamil-majority area of Sri Lanka.
### Indian army suffers heavy casualties
The Indian contingent was reinforced after the outbreak of fighting in October 1987 with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who put up more resistance than expected, inflicting heavy casualties on the Indians. About 460 Indian soldiers have been killed. Clashes continue, if on a lower level. On May 29, 18 Indian soldiers were killed when their truck hit a landmine.
In the April 1 issue of the Lanka Guardian, Mervyn de Silva wrote: "What has happened is that the IPF [Indian Peacekeeping Force], hopelessly over-estimating its strength (and indeed, magnifying the importance of conventional military force...) has paid an unexpectedly large price for this enormous error of judgement — not just lives...but time."
Other commentators have stressed that the Indians badly underrated the Tigers' fighting capacity, and that the longer the conflict continued the harder it would be for them to maintain their forces in Sri Lanka.
In its April 1 issue also, the Lanka Guardian reported a poll by the Indian Marketing and Research Group showing that about half of the Indian population favored withdrawal of the Indian Peacekeeping Force from Sri Lanka.
It will be interesting to see if the announcement of the first withdrawal of Indian forces will have an effect on the next series of provincial elections that will be held on June 9. *
• See also interview with Bala Tampoe on page 23. June 13, 1988 • #143 International Viewpoint
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