EPDP rules the roost — with PA’s blessings

By Nayana
"Voting for the election of Members of Parliament shall be free, equal and by secret ballot."

This is a requirement under Article 93 of the Constitution. It has been broadly interpreted by the Supreme Court. Yet events are taking place which throw serious doubts as to how far this cardinal principle will prevail both in the North and the South of this country at the upcoming parliamentary polls. Today we shall focus on certain disturbing trends that have emerged in the North.

The holding of a free and fair election in the Government controlled areas of the North would be one of the best ways of proving to the people of the area how much better off they are under a Sri Lankan government than under their self-styled liberators from the Tiger camp. Reports from the area indicate that during the recent Tiger onslaught on Army positions, hundreds of residents of the Jaffna peninsula demonstrated their faith in the Sri Lankan State by refusing Tiger demands to vacate their homes and move to LTTE controlled areas.

In a region where, for security reasons, Government control impacts on the lives of the people more directly than it does in areas where conditions are normal, the Govemment, in the greater interests of the nation, should hold the scales of authority in an even-handed manner and allow the people of the North the democratic space to elect Members of their choice. There is considerable evidence that this is not happening at present.

Unfair advantage

In an incident that has shocked election monitors and drawn sharp criticism from the Tamil United Liberation Front, the President by a special letter is reported to have reconvened the Jaffna District Coordinating Committee comprising MPs of the area (which would normally cease to exist once Parliament is dissolved) and put Douglas Devananda in charge of it. As head of the EPDP which is contesting the election, Devananda has a vital stake in the outcome. As Chairman of the Coordinating Committee he has control over the allocation of jobs, rations and other resources to the voters and State officials are answerable to him.

In addition, requests by the war-weary people of Jaffna to disarm all candidates have been disregarded and members of the Tamil party favoured by the Government are reportedly allowed to carry more, and heavier, weapons than their opponents. Thuggery and intimidation appear to be rife judging from the many incidents reported from the peninsula.

According to Tamil sources, a particular target of the EPDP are the SLFP party members in Jaffna who have ironically been denied nomination by the People’s Alliance leadership in favour of leaving the field clear for the EPDP. These persons have therefore handed in their papers as an independent group. Last Sunday a member of this group charged that he and his family were beaten up by an EPDP group from the Valigamam West Pradeshiya Sabha.

Election monitors and others accuse the EPDP cadres of refusing to let supporters of any other party or group campaign on Kayts and the other islands which form an important part of the Northern electorate, given the recent military reverses which have left large parts of the Wanni and Thennamarachi under Tiger control.

It is believed that the authorities are once again going to use the 1981 electoral register which was a decision that came in for severe criticism from election monitors and observers at last year’s Presidential election. By law electoral registers are required to be updated every year in June, and no explanation has been offered as to why this has not been done at least in the islands and the Jaffna Municipal area which has been under Government administration since 1995.

Outdated election registers

The use of such an old register not only disenfranchises an entire generation of young voters, but also leaves much room for impersonation given the frequent demographic changes that have occurred in the region due to displacement of persons by the fighting.

To take just one example as told to this writer by an election monitor, there are over 2600 voters’ names on the electoral register for Mandativu but only about 200 persons actually resident on that island. This leaves room for 2400 impersonated votes which observers believe to be a distinct possibility, given the fact that at present one political party is controlling access to the area - and Mandativu is just one of the smaller islands.

According to the report of one of the civic groups that monitored the Jaffna local government elections in 1998, there were allegations even at that time that this same party indulged in impersonation by using vinegar and lime to remove the so-called indelible ink on voters’ fingers.

Section 127B of the Parliamentary Elections Act as amended by Act No. 15 of 1988.

Another matter that is causing concern is the manner in which the Elections Department is planning to give effect to the provisions of Section 127B of the Parliamentary Elections Act as amended by Act No. 15 of 1988.

This section, introduced during the troubled conditions of the late 1980s, provides that a registered voter who "reasonably fears" that due to conditions prevailing in the area where his polling station is situated he will be unable to cast his vote at that polling station, may apply to the Commissioner of Elections within one week of notice of nominations requesting to be allowed to cast his vote at another station.

The Commissioner may "in his absolute discretion" determine at which polling station such voter shall be allowed to cast his vote. His/her vote is counted along with the other votes of the District where such voter is registered.

What is troubling observers is an apparent decision by the Commissioner to allow such voters a choice of several alternative stations at which they may cast their vote. This means that their names will be placed on the registers at all those stations, leaving room for them to vote more than once or for impersonators to vote in their name.

All these decisions will also have a significant impact on the civic rights of the approximately 27,000 former Sinhala residents of the Northern Province who were forced to leave the region during the 1980s and the approximately 40,000 Muslim residents of the same Province who were likewise driven out in 1990.

The use of a register that is nearly two decades old means that the children of these displaced persons who were not yet on the register when they were forced to leave the Province are permanently disenfranchised despite being now well above voting age.

Whether due to ignorance or apathy, few of the displaced people whose names were already on the registers in the North are believed to have made application to avail themselves of the provisions of Section 127B. The failure of the Elections Department to update the registers by deleting the names of these people means that their votes too can be impersonated, and by persons who avowedly represent a different ethnic community.

The present arrangements therefore serve to give legal sanctity to the ethnic cleansing of the Northern Province that is already a de facto reality.

Finally it must be asked for whose benefit all this is being done. The parliamentarians who claim to represent the people of the Northern Province were elected by a handful of votes in 1994. The numbers polled by them in most instances would not have been sufficient even to win a municipal ward in pre-1980 Jaffna.