Karuna’s party debarred from contesting polls

By Munza Mushtaq
In an obvious blow to LTTE renegade leader Karuna Amman’s much hyped political future, his political arm Tamileela Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP) will not be allowed to contest the forthcoming Eastern Province election scheduled to be held before the end of this year, The Nation learns.
The TMVP which has some 20 political offices in the Eastern Province and one in Polhengoda, Colombo has not been recognised or even been registered as a political party by the Commissioner of Elections Dayananda Dissanayake as of July 10, 2007.
The TMVP (also known in English as Tamileela People’s Liberation Tigers) initially submitted their application to the Department of Elections on October 12, 2004 to be a registered and a recognised political party in Sri Lanka.
“However, it’s been nearly three years since the application was handed over to the department by TMVP Secretary General G. R. Gnanarajah, but the department is yet to recognize this party,” highly placed sources told The Nation yesterday.
The latest list updated by the Elections Secretariat as of July 10, consists of 53 recognised political parties with each of these parties being granted a unique symbol, but the list does not include the TMVP.
“Some parties who submitted their application seeking approval from the department many months after the TMVP handed over their application, have already received recognition from the department,” sources added.
Deputy Elections Commissioner P.M. Siriwardena told The Nation that, “the process for approval takes time and there are rules that the department must adhere to. Simply because a certain group or anyone else sends letters under their letter heads that is no cause for the department to grant recognition to that particular group.”
He, however, pointed out that even though a group had no capability of contesting the election under a name they have propagated to the public because the name has neither been recognised nor registered by the Commissioner of Elections, the group still has the option of contesting the polls as an ‘Independent Group.’
But a political analyst noted that the TMVP not been recognised by the department was a huge blow to Karuna’s political future, given the fact that the renegade leader has been carrying out propaganda under the TMVP banner in the Eastern Province and mainly Batticaloa, and so contesting elections under the ‘Independent Group’ would result in him losing clout during the polls.
Karuna has meanwhile appointed close confidants Thileepan to Ampara, Illanthiriyan to Thoppigala and Jeewan to Trincomalee, to head his election campaign for the forthcoming polls.
The Nation reliably learns that Eelam Peoples Democratic Party Leader Douglas Devananda has urged the government to make sure that the Karuna faction conducts its political activities unarmed.

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