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Promise to establish new order

— PHOTO: AFP

IMPRESSIVE START: Sri Lanka’s leader of the main Opposition Ranil Wickremasinghe (left) listens to the former Foreign Minister, Mangala Samaraweera, at a mass rally in Colombo, on Thursday.

COLOMBO: The new-born “National Congress” organised an impressive protest rally against the alleged anti-people policies of the Rajapaksa Government and vowed to establish a new order in the island nation.

The Congress, forged by the United National Party (UNP) led by the former Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, and the rebel Sri Lanka Freedom Party leader, Mangala Samaraweera, intends to mobilise all like-minded parties and individuals to fight against the policies of the Rajapaksa Government.

The leaders at the rally charged Mr. Rajapaksa with manipulating the 2005 presidential election by influencing the Tamil Tigers with monetary inducements. The contention of the Opposition is that the LTTE gave a call for boycott of the poll at the last minute as part of deal with Mr. Rajapaksa.

The estimate of the crowd at the first public show of strength of the Congress varied from 50,000 to 1,00,000. Political and diplomatic observers here believe that it is an impressive start.

In response to the National Congress protest, the ruling combine has planned to host a series of meetings all over the nation to educate people on the achievement of the Government in the “liberation of the east” by ousting the Tigers and various other “pro-people” programmes.

The Sri Lanka Supreme Court on Thursday granted leave to proceed on a fundamental rights petition made by the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) on the mass eviction of Tamils from Colombo that took place on June 7. Two other petitions filed by evicted persons were also granted leave to proceed by the court. The eviction triggered protests within and outside Sri Lanka, prompting Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremenayake to express regrets and President Mahinda Rajapaksa to order an inquiry.

On a petition filed by the CPA, the apex court had, in an interim order on June 8, stayed the eviction of Tamils from lodges in Colombo as well as prevention of Tamils’ entry into the capital. The case will be heard on November 28.

The petitioners argued that evicting Tamils from Colombo was wrongful, unlawful and illegal and violated the fundamental rights of those evicted.

The widely criticised police move came after a statement by the Inspector General of Police on June 1 that Tamils cannot remain in Colombo without a valid reason.

Subsequent to the interim order, many of the people evicted were brought back by the police to their lodging houses.

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