Vote to save democracy!
Jaffna University Science Teachers’ Association
The forthcoming Presidential Election
is the last chance to save democracy in Sri Lanka. This is the time to prevent
the country sliding into the mire where the ordinary people endure huge privations
for the benefit of a band of rulers.
Development projects are planned to secure
fat commissions rather than to benefit the people. The money spent on
development and the money the ruling clique gets as commissions is money that
lawfully belongs to the people.
The rulers’ boast that they have
carried out huge development projects, while in reality taking an inordinate
share of the money as commissions, is an ongoing farce that is enacted to fool
the masses.
Tax money belonging to the people is
spent on luxurious living by a small powerful group. Interference in the
administration of justice, destruction of law and order, corruption and
complete misuse of power has reached unprecedented heights. Those who are paid
by the people to serve them have virtually become parasites with scant intention
of service.
This can be seen from the fact that
the peoples’ representatives in the North elected by popular vote are powerless
and cash-strapped, while those who have minuscule support enjoy limitless power,
cash and privilege.
It is true that the minorities’
question has been placed on the back burner against the need to protect and
revive democracy that is in imminent danger of being lost forever.
Neither of the two major candidates
nor their strongest supporters showed any indication that they understood the national
question. It is thus clear that they have no answer to this question that has
sapped, misdirected and wasted the energies of generations since independence
and not just of Tamils. However, it is a great blunder to ask Tamils to boycott
the presidential election for this reason. Democracy should first be saved for
the Tamils to have a voice to demand and fight for their rights. When a
democratic dispensation dawns on the entire country, the Tamils too can enjoy
its benefits. We must exercise this opportunity that is our right and duty as
citizens to cast our ballot at the forthcoming election to secure broader
options for the future.
Therefore the Tamils should cast
their vote without fail to demonstrate our intention to prevent misuse of our
tax money, and to secure justice, law and order and, above all, democracy in
this our country.
Default in not casting our vote would
strengthen dictatorship that would lead the country towards irreversible
destruction. This is the lesson we learn from the history of nations that went down
the path of dictatorship.
Even if our numbers are small they
may be the determining factor in the choice between democracy and dictatorship.
Had the Tamils used the power of their ballot at the 2005 presidential election
rather than boycott it; we may have secured a happier and less destructive
course of events.
