Political Killings and Their Gains

by A Rajendra

No sooner Sarath Fonseka was appointed Army commander by the President; he made very many changes in the army hierarchy that stripped several senior officers of their aspired positions, and - true enough - some were removed, while many others sent in their retirement papers. There was no doubt an air of a “coup” in the offing by these disgruntled officials. The bomb blast which seriously wounded Fonseka could, therefore, be an inside job.

One must bear in mind that the underworld in Sri Lanka is notoriously groomed for political killings because of corruption all around. Most mysterious killings are carried out by men serving jail sentences. It is well documented that some of the prisoners live a life of luxury in the prisons, and use their cell phones to talk with their operatives outside. These prisoners, in return, carry out strategically planned killing missions for their masters. This is with the connivance of the prison authorities. These prisoners execute their tasks and quietly slip back into the prisons, making it difficult for the police to trace these perpetrators or their crimes.  Most Government ministers have their own underworld gangs in the prisons.

It is in this backdrop that the attempt on the general’s life was made. Even Laxman Kadirgamar had enemies amongst the Sinhalese politicians because Kumaratunga had plans to give him an important portfolio. Political commentators strongly believe that his assassination was also an inside job, and the LTTE was put to blame by the government for political mileage. In doing so, the Government scored a point, and was able to hoodwink the EU and persuade them to keep the LTTE from visiting the EU.

The attempt on the life of the General was an inside job, no doubt. The fairy tale about the LTTE role, like the “jataka” stories of lore, does not hold water because the security situation is so treacherous that no Tamil in the remotest of possibilities can ever dream to move around in the highest ever enclaves of the Sri Lankan Army establishment without being put to ruthless search and arrest if he or she merely approaches the establishment, let alone entering it.. 

Moreover, the government ‘yarn’ that a pregnant Tamil woman who had come from Vavuniya and was temporarily residing on the outskirts of Colombo is too much to swallow, because she would have been snatched off by the police no sooner she entered Colombo and spent at least several months in police custody before release. The million dollar question is, how could a civilian enter the security establishment for medical attention when there was the government hospital not too far away. The answer is that this story is a fabrication to mislead the US and other countries that are supporting the action of the Government in its war against the LTTE.

As correctly reasoned out by  Rev Chandi Sinnathurai,  the Government had plans to evict the Tamils from Trincomalee.  The Government, therefore, named the LTTE as the masterminds of the assassination attempt to justify their bombing of the Tamils out of Trincomalee. This was part of the master plan to take effect after any excuse, in this case the bomb blast and its carnage. 

The report of the Nonviolent Peace Force made immediately after the massacre of the Tamils in Trincomalee a few days before the assassination attempt, clearly states that, within 15 minutes of the explosion in the market, Sinhala mobs had a field day and were out on a killing spree, burning and looting Tamil shops and slaughtering Tamils.  This, in itself, proves that the event was well planned and executed from above. None of the reports mentioned Sinhalese killed in the blast, which goes to prove that the LTTE was not behind the bomb blast. This was a well orchestrated operation to create unrest in the country so that the Government could put off the Geneva Talks. It was easy for the Government to put the blame of the blast on the LTTE.

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