Our sincere hope:Devolution would be adequate enough to meet the demands of our brother community who had been subjected to deplorable injustices.!!!

The Roses and Thorns of the APRC Proposals

Migara Doss

It seemed as though the battle would never end, both camps fought valiantly with pride for their nationality ready as ever to sacrifice their lives . But one camp outnumbered the other and soon got the upper hand in the battle. And finally it ended bringing tears of hopeless defeat to one camp and tears of hope and joy to another.

Thus ended our country’s long driven ethnic war making room for peace and solidarity amongst the two camps the Tamil and Sinhalese population.

It is now time to strike the final nail into the coffin of ethnic disparity which would end the long dark night and make the new sun rise for our nation.

It is at this juncture that the government is ready to bring about the much awaited All Party Representative Council proposals which contain its final consensus regarding a just solution for our country’s ethnic issue. In looking into the depth of these new proposals and closely scrutinizing it we find various pros and cons in it which could be discussed as below,

First and foremost these new proposal’s brings a sign of hope with its moves to introduce a new constitution replacing the present one which had been widely criticized for fortifying the center with immense power to dominate other provincial state bodies making them beleaguered.

Furthermore reintroduction of the Westminster style legislature consisting with two chambers would pave the way for greater devolution of power for the provinces dignifying their presence in the law making body while ensuring the unitary structure of the country. This new introduction would also do greater good to politics with altering the present representative system that would improve the dastard political culture now practiced by our representatives.

The proposed establishment of village councils too is another paramount decision which aims to carry development into the grass root levels of the provinces, but the question still lies as to whether development would expand to the poor souls in the villages or would it be confined to politicians who prosper daily utilizing all the power and resources at their reach.

And in looking at the much debated thorns of this new invention which are highlighted by the very benches of the government itself draws speculations in our minds of the credibility of this new horizon as promised by its founders.

A significant feature we see through this is that even though the committee is titled as ‘All Party’ representative council it is a pity to find that 11 out of the 13 parties indulged in forming these proposals happen to be government affiliated ally’s which humiliates it’s very concept.

And also the greater devolution of power within the legislative body amongst the provinces and the central government would be highly contingent since it had been the dexterity of politicians to cause interferences, obstructions and estrangements in political practice that would raise questions of the practical credibility and the success level of this effort to devolve power. It is our sincere hope that this devolution would be adequate enough to meet the demands of our brother community who had been subjected to deplorable injustices throughout the past and would bring a new light of hope to Sri Lanka. Will the establishment of a constitutional body resolve the early defects of an introduced new constitution?

Or will the new State bodies to concentrate on devolving land, water and police powers be able to carry out their work with dignity? It is time that has the answers for all these covert issues. As for us the best we could do right now is to gaze hopefully at the far far west and wait for the sunrise as promised in a new Sri Lanka through these new APRC Proposals.

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