TNA parliamentarians Mavai Senathirajah and S. Sritharan visited the uprooted villagers on a fact finding mission on Friday. The occupation of the fertile lands, lying between the Kokku’laay lagoon in the east and Kent and Dollar Farms in the southwest, is one of the major threats of the territorial integrity of the Tamil country.
The Tamil villagers told the TNA parliamentarians that the entire region would be gone within 2-years if the Tamil polity was not able to stop the occupation of the land and the sea. The Tamils would be forced to seek other areas as they are denied of access to their livelihood, both in the land and the sea.
The uprooted Tamils told the TNA parliamentarians that they are not being allowed to even see their lands in Aamaiyan-ku’lam, Uththaraayan-ku’lam, Adaiyak-ka’ruththaan, Poovaamaduk-ka’ndal, Erigncha-kaadu, Naay-kadichcha-mu’rippu, Thaddaamalai, Chakaalaththuve’li and Chuvanthaa-mu’rippu.
To visit their lands, the people have to cross the Kokku’laay river and the Sri Lanka Army is denying access to them by not allowing them to cross the river. The SLA was saying that there are ‘land mines’ while Colombo is carving out a new Sinhala division in the name of ‘Weli-oya’.
The uprooted people also told the TNA parliamentarians that there were no landmines in their agricultural lands that have been under the hands of the SLA since 1984.
The TNA MPs asked the people not to lose hope and promised to act on their behalf. They also urged the people not to consider leaving their places.
The deep-sea side of Kokku’laay is completely forfeited to the Sinhalese already.
From Mullaiththeevu to Kokku’laay, the entire coast is now a monopoly of Sinhala fishermen who have come with hundreds of boats, while the resettled Tamil fishermen of the land cannot get into the waters.
The Sinhala administrative division, which has been set up last year with a toponym ‘Welioya,’ renaming the Tamil Ma’nal-aa’ru, will permanently wedge the demographic contiguity of the northern and eastern provinces of the country of Eezham Tamils occupied by Sri Lanka’s military.
The division has been planned in such a way to demographically link the Anuradhapura district of the Sinhala North Central Province with the eastern coast at Kokku’laay, through recently established Sinhala colonies. With accelerated colonisation, soon the division may even pave way for a Sinhala electorate in the Mullaiththeevu district.
TN