Any living
ex-LTTE cadres, who demand for the setting up of cemeteries to serve as
memorials for their dead in the 30-year war, will be arrested, Defence
Secretary, Retired Colonel Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, told Ceylon Today. He was
responding to a question from this newspaper as to what the reaction of the
government would be to the demand of the ex-LTTE cadres that such a war
cemetery be
erected to remember the LTTE cadres, who were killed in the war,
amid a resolution passed by the Chavakachcheri Pradeshiya Sabha towards this
end.
"The
LTTE is a banned organization, both locally and internationally and they have
no legitimacy in the first place.
They have no
right whatsoever to ask for war cemeteries to commemorate the dead. Anyone who
does that, will be arrested," Rajapaksa said.
"We
will do the same thing that we did to the other ex-LTTE cadres, by arresting
them and rehabilitating them as they are misguided youth, who were a part of a
banned organization and who wreaked havoc over three decades," the Defence
Secretary said.
He also said
the cemeteries could not be located and constructed at anyone's will but they
were located in certain specific areas.
Responding
to a question as to what the reaction of the government was, on the statement
made by recently-appointed Chief Minister of the Northern Province, C.V.
Wigneswaran, that he and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Councillors of the
Northern Provincial Council (NPC), were working towards getting land and police
powers to the North, Rajapaksa said that it was not possible.
He said the
fact that there was a Supreme Court Judgment given to the effect that there
would not be land powers devolved to the Provinces, should make the Chief
Minister and the Council realize the impossibility of the NPC having land
powers to themselves.
Commenting
in police powers, he asked why the NPC should be given special police powers
when all the other Provincial Councils did not have separate police powers. He
also reminded that President Mahinda Rajapaksa too had spelt out the government
would not be devolving police powers to the NPC.
"Why
should the NPC have special privileges on police powers?" the Defence
Secretary queried and added, "The core function of the police is to
maintain law and order and that is the function of the Central Government and
the mandate of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who is also the Defence Minister
and Commander-in- Chief of the Armed Forces.
"What
the NPC should do is to help the police to maintain law and order and they
could assist the police in the prevention of crime. There could be a system of
community policing where the politicians – the Members of Parliament and the
Provincial Councillors, the business community and the members of the public
could assist in the prevention of crime.
"Therefore,
there was no need for a separate police force for the NPC. All the stakeholders
could cooperate with the police and that is what they should be doing," he
said.
Asked how he
sees the development and the administration of the North in the light of the
NPC being dominated by the TNA, he said the TNA will have to cooperate with the
government in terms of decisions taken to develop the North.
"The
TNA can utter their rhetoric on election platforms, but they will have to
consult the government on key issues. That is because the North is not some
other country, but it is a part of Sri Lanka. The North also comes under the
aegis of the government and Sri Lanka too," he quipped.
If
they do not cooperate with the government and engage in development work that
the people and the voters expect of them, the Northerners will undoubtedly
reject them, Rajapaksa added.
Ceylon Today
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