No lands for locals but 700 acres to China as part of a debt settlement

Siva Parameswaran

War-affected Tamil in northern Sri Lanka fears their traditional homelands will soon become a Chinese colony after a government proposal to give away more than 700 acres of land to China as part of its debt settlement.

Colombo is said to have offered vast tracts of land in the impoverished districts of Killinochi, Mullaitivu, and Jaffna to China. While thousands of families who were still suffering the trauma of the war and its aftermath struggle to get a small parcel of land, a huge area of land is being given to China locals say in anguish.

“In the Northern Province, more than 15,000 families are living without any piece of land for themselves. The government never came forward to allot lands to the war-affected people in the province, but the action to allot vast lands to China creates a strong suspicion in us” Karuppiah Jeyakumar President of the Federation of village development societies in Karachi & village women development associations in Pradeshya Sabha area told local journalists.

The identified forest area allegedly planned to hand over to China is fertile land and serves as a means of livelihood for thousands of Tamils. They fear once the process of transferring the land to the Chinese takes effect they would become aliens in their own traditional homeland. Locals say while they are trying to get back to their normal lives after more than a decade of postwar trauma amidst the nonreturn of their lands due to constant threat and intimidation, the proposal has come as an irreversible shock for them.

The Tamils who don’t have land or who have lost their lands due to forced occupation and continuous relocation for fear of safety during the war say they are ‘living like nomads’ even today.

Jaffna district Tamil National Alliance MP Sivagnanam Siritharan says handing over the land to the Chinese is part of a large plan of the Sri Lankan government with sinister intentions. He alleges that plans were initiated more than a decade back to alter the demography in the North and in particular in and around the area now planned to hand over to China.

“Iranaimadu tank acts as the boundary between Mullaitivu and Killinochi districts. During war times and in the post-war period the Sri Lankan government -as part of its long-term plan -took forward to make the area south of the tank a Sinhala area or colonize it through Sinhala people. In 2011 when Basil Rajapaksa visited Mankulam he made an announcement that in the next 25 years, it would be developed into a city with a population of 500,000 people”.

The 500 acres now planned to be allocated are to the south of the Iranaimadu tank which is one of the most vital sources of water to the poverty-stricken Tamils of the Northern Province. As per the plan devised by the Rajapakshas thousands of houses were built with the intention of relocating the Sinhala people.

When those houses were not used for the planned Sinhala people resettlement they brought in a scheme for relocating the military personnel there. Most of such constructed houses are unfit for use now according to the locals. In such a situation TNA MP Siritharan says he has information from reliable sources that the Sri Lankan government is planning full efforts to hand over 700 acres of land to China. He says handing over the lands to China would have an impact on India’s security.

“From the angle of India’s security and the sustainability of the Eelam Tamils, this will cause a huge impact. Sri Lanka’s action to hand over these two stretches of lands, in particular handing over 500 acres to the south of Iranaimadu and then in the border areas of Jaffna and Killinochi-near the Mandalai Pillayar Kovil- Pullaveli, Kattaikadu, Vetrilaikeni is very dangerous”.

Activists like Jeyakumar say this is not the first time that such an effort is taken by Colombo. Earlier too such attempts were stopped by the public.

“Even two or three years back at Kowdarimunai in Killinochi district, the government took forward a proposal to sell a bit of coastal area to China for sea cucumber farms. But after strong protests from the public and people’s representatives, we understand that proposal has been dropped. Within 2-3 years of that issue dying down this proposal (of handing over land to China) has picked up”.

He also questions the rationale behind handing over the lands in the traditional homeland to a foreign country and questions how the country would handle if such a demand is raised by other nations which have loaned huge sums of money to Sri Lanka.

“If handing over these land areas to China in lieu of the loans, Sri Lanka will be in a situation to act similarly for loans obtained from India, Pakistan, and European countries. If such a situation arises then Sri Lanka may have to sell such places and as the next action, they will try to sell areas where people live”.

Sivagnanam Siritharan says continuous governments have been attempting Sinhala colonization of the North through various means. He alleges that under the guise of bringing in the Mahaweli project to the south of Iranaimadu associated with huge job opportunities, Sinhala resettlements were planned, thereby forcefully trying to change the demographics and annihilation of the Tamil identity and ethnicity.

In places like Karippattamurippu-Oddusuddan, the government is planning to forcefully grab land under the guise of Buddhist artifacts being found by the Archeology department according to the MP.

We will take all efforts and action to stop such colonization and handing over of lands to China.

Karuppiah Jeyakumar fears once the lands are handed over to China, Chinese people will start settling there or will set up research institutions with strategic intentions which will adversely impact the Tamil people in Killinochi and Mullaitivu districts. He says such a move by the government will not only affect their livelihood but also seriously affect future generations.

“Sri Lanka is now not only selling monkeys but also the forest areas where they live to China. The situation is very scary in the country. First the monkeys, then the lands, next the people will be exported?” he queries.

Over 300 families in the Killinochi district alone live with their relatives amidst tiring circumstances as they don’t have their own lands to stay.