After years of neglect a dependable census has been carried out in
Jaffna. According to it the total population of Jaffna is around
608,000, much lower than previously estimated. Very large scale
internal and external migration is the cause for this reduction. The
university admission scheme and parliamentary seats for Jaffna depends
on its relative population. However, these vital numbers were not
updated after 1971 owing to various reasons mainly the war. Apart from
the war organised criminals and racist political elements stopped all
attempts to iron out apparent differences.
It is high time these vital numbers are updated based on present day
realities. Owing to the use of 1971 population percentages and the
large population flux out from Jaffna, its populace enjoys undue and
unfair benefits in both university admission and parliamentary
representation at the expense of other districts. This is not only
gravely unfair for the other districts it also amounts to downright
corruption on the part of the government to waste much scarce economic
resources with no return to the country. What is worse is that some of
those who exploit the unfair advantage and get a good education at the
expense of others end up financing the LTTE to kill the very same
people who educated them. This mockery must stop now.
If the total national population is taken at twenty (20) million and
if the number of legislators elected on the district basis is 196,
Jaffna district should have not more than six (6) legislators
according to the Pro****tionate Representation (PR) system. However, at
the moment there are ten (10) allowed from Jaffna. Therefore a forty
percent (40%) reduction is required to re-establish fair share and
equity. As expected, most of them work tirelessly to the detriment to
the country! This is a double whammy and immediate steps must be taken
to amend this. On the other hand, districts of higher population
growth suffer as they required more votes to get one legislator
elected than in districts with a pro****tionately reducing population.
This was amply visible at the last general election where the JHU and
TNA received an almost similar number of votes but TNA ended up having
more than double the number of seats JHU obtained. This is at the very
least anti-democratic and certainly discriminatory. This is the real
reason behind the non-display and non-representation of people's
wishes in parliament; a very dangerous situation that can lead to the
loss of faith in the democratic system.
The same can be said about university admission. Children from
districts like Matara are severely disadvantaged because of the use of
old and irrelevant population data. A viable alternative is to
reallocate a district quota based on the number of candidates sitting
for the GCE (A/L) examination for the first time each year. This will
take care of unfair advantages the present system offers to the
Northerners at the expense of the Southerners. Unfairness is even more
amplified when tax collection is considered. Bulk of tax money is
collected from the 'south' and there is no justification spending a
higher-than-pro****tionate education and administration expenses in the
'north' as the tax payers expect a commensurate return for them. It is
a robbery of taxpayers' money if it is not equitably distributed
throughout the country. This crime must stop.
One popular argument that sustains this gross unfairness and injustice
links the LTTE to the inequation (it is not an equation!). Some argue
that one root cause of the war is the equitable university admission
scheme! This is a cruel argument justifying barbarianism over equity.
The right approach is to identify the reality that crime never pays
and if anyone justifies terrorism on an equitable scheme fair for
everyone, he is only going against the rules of nature and natural
justice. Unfortunately for the proponents of this evil theory,
evidence suggest otherwise. According to them the LTTE was born due to
the university admission scheme that reduced the previous intake from
Jaffna. However, over the years due to the population movement,
children from Jaffna enter university from almost all the district on
top of having a very high unfair advantage in Jaffna itself! But has
it reduced the LTTE? On the contrary, it has indirectly strengthened
LTTE finances!
This is the hard reality shallow thinkers do not posses the faculty to
apprehend. A Tamil politician who is unpopular enough not to get
elected and who also leads a race-based political party is vehemently
against equity and fair share in university admissions across all the
districts. Although he calls himself a moderate, his ultra race-
centred justifications of the present unfair university admissions
scheme (rendered unfair by the use of outdated population data) amply
display the hidden racist in him. It is no surprise he is also
promoting racist federalism! While we celebrate his non-violent
approach, we must be cognisant of the simple fact that there are many
non-violent means of doing dirty tricks on the gullible. The CFA is a
classic example. An old adage goes, 'impartiality is either the
ignorance of a fool or the trickery of a knave'. While Lankans must
not be impartial between fairness and unfairness, they should also be
open to the innocent-looking tricks that can land them in a worthless
position. To cite another example, it is like the folklore of the two
famers who literally shared a cow by demarcating a physical division
while the cow was alive. The front part went to one scatterbrain while
the hind went to a trickster. The latter continued to fool the former
by praising the serene face of the cow which was in the part of the
former. If a section of Sri Lankans are fooled into surrendering their
fair share and democratic rights to the detriment of the nation, it is
a crime against the Lankan Buddhist society marked by the strength of
generosity, compassion and sacrifice.
We urge the government to take immediate and effective action in
ironing out unfairness in university admission and parliamentary
representation caused by massive population movements that took place
in the last three decades. Steps must also be taken to reverse all and
every 'victory' LTTE won with a racist connotation including ethnic
cleansing of Muslims and Sinhalese from the North-East, merging the
North with the East, suppression of democratic rights and democratic
representation of certain regional minorities in the North East,
tolerance of separatism and recognition of the LTTE as anything more
than an uncivilised terrorist organisation. All these must end soon as
we have put up with these nonsense for far too long. Terror cannot
always keep us silent.
|
