Category: Breaking News

Former Chief Minister of the Eastern Province Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan alias Pilleyan has been summoned to the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) tomorrow (12), in order to record a statement related to the allegations in the documentary aired by British television network ‘Channel 4’ on the 2019 Easter Sunday terror attacks in Sri Lanka.

Speaking at a press conference held today (11), Police Media Spokesman DIG Nihal Thalduwa said that the CID has launched a probe into the relevant incident as per a complaint lodged by an organization with the Ministry of Public Security against the statement made by Azad Maulana to Channel 4 on the 2019 Easter Sunday terror attacks.

He said that accordingly, an investigation was launched by the CID into the controversial statements made by several individuals regarding the Easter attacks.

On 06 September 2023, Channel 4 aired a controversial documentary containing startling accusations relating to the bombings on Easter Sunday (April 21) in 2019 which targeted several Catholic churches and luxury hotels in Sri Lanka. The carnage claimed the lives of more than 260 people and left hundreds of others wounded.

Channel 4’s new ‘Dispatches’ investigation titled ‘Sri Lanka’s Easter Bombings’ is a nearly 50-minute-long videos with serious, yet straightforward allegations about the attacks. It was based on the testimonies of high-placed whistleblowers who alleged that senior governmental officials were complicit in this heinous act.

The main whistleblower Hanzeer Azad Maulana was a spokesman for LTTE’s breakaway group Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pullikal (TMVP) led by former MP Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan alias Pillayan.

According to the documentary, Maulana, who has sought asylum overseas after facing fraud charges here, has witnessed a meeting in Puttalam in 2018, between the suicide bombers and a top Sri Lankan intelligence officer prior to the Easter Sunday attacks.

Claiming that he had, on the directives of Pillayan, arranged the said meeting between then-army intelligence chief Major General Suresh Sallay and the National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ) members including its leader Zahran Hashim, Maulana said the plot to create insecurity in the country to pave way for former president Gotabaya Rajapaksa to win the presidential election later in 2019 was hatched over 2-3 years.

The documentary, which recapped the country’s political situation, also gave a lengthy commentary on former presidents Mahinda Rajapaksa and Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s time in power and their attempts to return to power after election defeats.

Recalling the 2009 disappearance of journalist Lasantha Wickrematunga who was a prominent critic of the then-government, the ‘Dispatches’ investigation video claimed that Mahinda Rajapaksa’s administration had formed a clandestine death squad called the ‘Tripoli Platoon’ with the support of Pillayan’s group to crack down on anti-government media persons.

It had interviewed former senior CID officer Nishantha Silva who was investigating the disappearance of Wickrematunga. He claimed that he found phone record evidence putting ‘Tripoli Platoon’ members at the scene and that Gotabaya Rajapaksa had ‘direct monitoring’ of this death squad.

The documentary also presented testimonies from His Eminence Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, journalist Frederica Jansz who was a witness in the ‘White Flag’ case, the brother of journalist Lasantha Wickrematunga, former commissioner of Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) Ambika Satkunanathan and former diplomat Sarath Kongahage.

However, Kongahage later accused the British television network of distorting his comments from the interview. Calling a media briefing on September 12, 2023, the former ambassador said Channel 4 had used his remarks out of context.

Voting rights would allow overseas Sri Lankan (OSL) workers a voice in economic policies that impact their remittances and financial interests back home, the Institute of Policy Studies has said.

“OSLs prefer a say in how the macroeconomy back in Sri Lanka is managed by elected officials, i.e. how does the government spend the foreign exchange OSLs regularly send as remittances?” IPS Research Fellow Dr Bilesha Weeraratne said.

“While OSLs may not have voting rights yet, those who regularly remit earnings back to Sri Lanka have already demonstrated their influence — by voting with their wallets.”

The think tank said several methods for overseas Sri Lankans to vote in the upcoming parliamentarian election have been considered including “advanced in-person (similar to postal voting in Sri Lanka), voting by mail, facsimile, or internet, as well as proxy voting.”

But achieving this goal in time for the upcoming Parliamentary election on November 14 or the pending provincial or local government elections in 2025 is not easy, IPS conceded.

The full statement is reproduced below:

Voting Beyond Borders: Can Overseas Sri Lankans Finally Have Their Say?

By Dr Bilesha Weeraratne

The recent presidential election in Sri Lanka marked a series of “firsts,” setting it apart from previous elections. It saw a record-low number of 350,516 valid voters per candidate, implementation of the Regulation of Election Expenditure Act of 2023, and a second count of votes. Notably, there was also greater engagement from Overseas Sri Lankans (OSLs) in the country’s electoral process than at any time previously.

Indeed President Anura Kumara Dissanayaka actively engaged with Sri Lankan expatriates during his campaign, visiting countries including South Korea, Australia, the USA, Canada, Sweden, the UK and Japan. Continuing a trend from the previous presidential election in 2019, there was evidence of Sri Lankans returning to vote. However, despite this enthusiasm, the long-standing debate over granting OSLs the right to vote from abroad remains unresolved. Of the OSLs, it also means 1.5 million Sri Lankan workers abroad could not vote in the recent election according to the SLBFE.

Voting with Their Wallets

While OSLs may not have voting rights yet, those who regularly remit earnings back to Sri Lanka have already demonstrated their influence—by voting with their wallets. In the run-up to the 2022 economic crisis, government efforts to attract more formal remittances by offering higher interest rates failed to convince OSLs, as the formal foreign exchange rate offered was far below the informal rate. As a result, in 2022, remittances to Sri Lanka declined by a record 42%. Compared to the steady 10-year average USD 6.4 billion inflow (from 2010 to 2020), the decline to USD 3.7 billion was the final nail in the coffin that sparked the 2022 sovereign debt default.

Figure 1: Annual remittances in USD Billion and as a Percentage of GDP: 2010-2023

Source: CBSL

Remittance and Voting Rights

The literature identifies three mechanisms for linking the receipt of remittances with political participation.

1) Income Channel: those with greater resources are able to devote more resources (both in terms of material support and time) to political activities;

2) Independence Channel: remittances reduce the dependence of recipients on the government for material prosperity; and

3) Insurance Channel -remittances promote feelings of economic security in recipients that allow them to pay more attention to non-material concerns.

While these mechanisms are for all voters in households receiving remittances, OSLs prefer a say in how the macroeconomy back in Sri Lanka is managed by elected officials, i.e. how does the government spend the foreign exchange OSLs regularly send as remittances? what are the interest rates on their savings? how is inflation feeding into the purchasing power of their remittances? how is the foreign exchange rate affecting the disposable income of their remittances? how are savings and investments of their remittances taxed? and what are the public services available to their families left behind? to name a few. The answers to such questions are linked to election promises and how governments actually perform when in office. Voting rights would allow OSLs a voice in economic policies that impact their remittances and financial interests in Sri Lanka.

Overseas Absentee Voting: A Long-Awaited Promise

Providing voting rights or Overseas Absentee Voting (OAV) has been in discussion for many years, with various candidates, including the current president, promising to make it a reality. Sri Lanka has also ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families, which calls for migrant workers’ voting rights (Article 41). Many previous governments, though keen, have not been successful on this front. Previous efforts include a Parliamentary Select Committee for Electoral Reforms recommending voting rights for OSLs in 2021, and a Special Presidential Commission in 2023 (among other issues) being required to make recommendations on a mechanism for OSL voting rights. In 2023, the Election Commission developed a beta version of an online method for registering OSLs for voting. However, according to the Commissioner General of Elections their hands are tied “until the Parliament passes a law to enable migrant workers to vote from their destination states.”

How to Make Overseas Absentee Voting a Reality

There are many possible and sophisticated ways to implement OAV, including advanced in-person (similar to postal voting in Sri Lanka), voting by mail, facsimile, or internet, as well as proxy voting (where a duly authorised representative or a proxy vote on behalf of the absent voter). Some countries such as the Philippines, for instance, use a combination of in-person and postal voting.

For Sri Lanka, keeping things simple would be one important mindset in transitioning from an eternal election promise to making overseas absentee voting a reality. A manageable starting point could be advanced in-person in-embassy voting, which would function analogous to Sri Lanka’s postal voting system. Embassies could serve as analogous to postal voting centers for expatriates, and OLSs to postal voters.

Hence, learning from the Philippines, a few key steps in the process of allowing in-person in-embassy voting are:

1. Enshrine in the Constitution the right of qualified OSLs to vote
2. Enact an Act related to OAV
3. Define a system and the mechanism for exercising such rights, covering aspects of
a. Defining qualifications for OAV
b. Identifying a registration procedure for eligible OSL
c. Identifying voting and vote counting mechanisms.

Not an Easy Road

Implementing OAV will not be without challenges. For Sri Lankans residing in countries without a local embassy, registration and voting might require travel to the nearest consular post. While critics would highlight that time and financial cost would “deter the diaspora from proactively partaking in voting”, employees such as female domestic workers would have the added challenge of seeking “approval of their masters and traveling a long distance to both register and vote”. Mail voting or assigning longer voting periods, including weekends, could alleviate some of these concerns.

Other concerns of out-of-country voting include potential vote buying and exploitation. Activists also raise concerns about whether politically appointed staff in diplomatic missions would influence, especially the unskilled and voiceless OSLs. Therefore, there is a need for a “mechanism with checks and balances” to “prevent the integrity of the electoral result from being questioned”.

While criticisms of each optional OAV method will likely emerge, it is important to start taking initial steps toward one feasible and practical option. The issues can be ironed out with time, and more sophisticated options can be pursued.

Finally, it is important to realize that achieving this goal in time for the upcoming Parliamentary election on 14 November or the pending provincial or local government elections in 2025 is not easy. Yet, initial steps towards this change are much needed and the time is right for it.