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| Sunday, 21 April 2002 |
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Batticaloa: becoming good neighbours again by FRANCES BULATHSINGHALA in Batticaloa One week after returning from his rendezvous with the LTTE leader in Vanni, the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) leader, Rauf Hakeem says that the Muslim community is satisfied with what they believe is an amicable understanding between the LTTE hierarchy and the Muslims. Batticaloa is cited by him as the best example.
"Everything seems fine. I have explained to the people about the understanding that I have reached with Velupillai Prabhakaran," Minister Hakeem told local and foreign journalists visiting Batticaloa, last Thursday, referring to the understanding reached between the LTTE and the SLMC about issues pertaining to the Muslims and the peace process. Having visited the Batticaloa hospital, several key mosques, schools and the Kachcheri where he had met with the Norwegian Deputy Foreign Minister, Vidar Helgesen , Hakeem said that the Muslims had to search for an independent role in the peace process. "We have given our assurances to Norway that we will be a neutral force in the peace process", Hakeem said. "We are not tools in anybody's hands. A lot depends on the follow up to the assurances given by the LTTE leader. A genuine power sharing would enable all communities equal land rights to live as citizens of this country. We did not want to point our fingers at their past mistakes. We did not want to get into any contentious areas. We are optimistic. Cautiously optimistic," the SLMC leader said. "President Kumaratunga should not be sidelined in the peace process. She is in a sense non chauvinistic. We should appeal to her sense of justice," he declared. Whether it is with regard to specifying the role of the Muslims, the peace assurances of the LTTE or the role of his former ally, President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, Rauf Hakeem proves to be a man of tact. Asked whether he was aware of a sense of unease, fear and betrayal among Muslims in Batticaloa and other areas of the North East who had borne the brunt of LTTE threats and extortions over the past months, the response of the Minister of Muslim Affairs was that it was the responsibility of the Government to see to that the LTTE acts in accordance with the peace process. Annai Boopathi Our responsibility is to try and keep the LTTE on track. They cannot trifle with the Muslims. Their credibility is at stake. They will have to keep to their promises", Hakeem reiterated. The venue of the press conference was the Siddique Arabic College adjoining the Nooraniya Mosque down Mustafa Road in Kathankudy , near Batticaloa which has over 72 mosques and a dense population of Muslims. And while Muslims in their hundreds mill around the Kathankudy area, attending to trading, praying and mixing around in Muslim fraternity just 12 km away, thousands of Tamils - bejeweled women, spruced up men and uniformed school children come in droves to the one month old memorial dedicated to the LTTE heroine Annai Boopathi, the 50 year old member of the LTTE Mothers' Front who died on 19 April 1988 after 22 days of fasting at the nearby Mamangam kovil,in a bid to get the Indian Peace Keeping Force out. The coastal road to the memorial looks like an eastern Galle Face with children gorging on kadale and vade freshly fried on the beach (a respected distance from the grey walls that surround the memorial ground). Annai Boopathi banners, the wording of which would probably give professional fiction writers a run for their money, begin from Batticaloa town written in 'LTTE colours' - red and yellow. The sudden burst of fire crackers startled the visiting journalists, who thought bombs were exploding. But the people took it in the stride as fire crackers were normal during the month long observance. The Annai Boopathi museum, en route to the memorial, is filled with hundreds of photographs of the ex nurse of the Batticaloa General Hospital. The spot where she is buried is now an enclosure built with pure marble which could be described as a spectacular shrine with the representation of a tomb built in the centre. The three fourth of an acre in which the 'shrine' is located is meticulously kept. Four hundred wall lights and twenty garden lights burn bright while school children busy themselves watering the 2000 odd pots containing plants as exotic as one can get in this region. Masons conscientiously put finishing touches to the 'shrine' built in little over one month after the government granted clearance on March 06 for both the memorial and a childrens' park to be located outside the memorial centre. Twenty six year old Kannan, a product of the Batticaloa Technical College who supervised the construction and who ended up in hospital overstraining himself trying to complete the structure in 26 days, says that he distinctly remembers sitting with his father by the side of Annai Boopathi while she fasted. Heroine "We are willing to live together with the Muslims and the Sinhalese ", says Annai Boopathi's eldest daughter, Shanthi Yogeswaran, draped in a silk saree, heavily jeweled and with a bag full of flowers to be strewn on her mother's grave. "My sister was then 12 years old. I was twenty two. My two brothers were in their teens. Our mother is a heroine", she says with a wide smile. She is ignorant of the intricacies of the peace process. She is also ignorant of actions with regard to the Muslim community which the LTTE leader has publicly apologized for. To the question as to how she would feel if she had a Muslim neighbour (a reality in Eastern Batticaloa and other Northeast areas) if the LTTE leader keeps to his promises, her answer is that she would 'love to have a Muslim neighbour' (or a Sinhala one she adds quickly) as long as there is 'equality'. A smile is all that is given as answer as to what she means by equality. Shanthi is basking in the glory of her mother's martyrdom and all the celebration around it, and yet, she seems clueless about the basic issues underlying the movement for which her mother died. It looked as if she was swept up by a current triggered by terms like 'liberation', 'self-determination' and 'equality', words used in plenty by those living in the North East. Asked to explain what they mean by these terminologies, most of them who extol the need for liberation get tongue tied. The daughter of the woman whom the LTTE has chosen to glorify as the 'heroine who has no parallel' is no exception. |
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