Expat Tamils endorse bigger mandate for President

by Ananth PALAKIDNAR

More than ninety per cent of expatriate Tamils domiciled in Europe and Scandinavia have vehemently condemned the United National Party (UNP) and its coalition the United National Alliance saying that the party was responsible for the conflict in Sri Lanka for three decades, and urged the Tamils in the North and the East to re-elect President Mahinda Rajapaksa in the Presidential poll in January next year.

This was revealed in a survey conducted by the Paris based Dish Asia Network (DAN) television channel among its viewers in Europe and Scandinavia on Friday, on the forthcoming Presidential poll in Sri Lanka in January next year.

According to the Chairman of DAN S.S. Kuganathan, a majority of viewers of the television channel had expressed their views in support of President Rajapaksa and urged their kith and kin in the North and the East of Sri Lanka to elect President Rajapaksa for the second time in order to strengthen democracy and to strengthen the region’s economy in the future.

“Who is the better candidate in the forthcoming Presidential poll ?” was the question posed to DAN viewers.

Here are comments by some of the viewers.

Haran from London: United National Party and its leaders are responsible for communal unrest in Sri Lanka. UNPers hurt the feelings of Jaffna people by setting on fire the Jaffna Public Library in 1981. The UNP also instigated the communal unrest in the country in 1983.

The UNP regime armed the LTTE against the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) and paved the way for the outfit to strengthen itself.

Therefore, Tamil speaking voters from the North and the East should reject the UNP led coalition and its candidate Sarath Fonseka in the forthcoming Presidential poll.

Jasintha Hermany: “By annihilating the LTTE, President Mahinda Rajapaksa has created peace, which remained a distant dream in the North and the East for more than three decades. The people in the North and the East are now happy with the normality that returned to their region.

Price of essential items have come down. The A-9 route which remains the lifeline to the people in the North has been re-opened. Several development activities have been taking place in an encouraging manner. So to stabilise the peace that was created in the North and the East, President Rajapaksa should be re-elected.

The DAN TV programme lasted for two hours from 9 pm to 11 pm European time on Friday.