The Hon. K.V. Samantha Viddyarathna - Minister of Plantation and Community Infrastructure

¶ 01 Hon. Deputy Chairperson, we are debating the Batalanda Commission Report. The incidents of that period were not matters for a comfortable chamber like today’s; they concerned a torture apparatus that brutally killed university students, lawyers, doctors and countless young men and women.

¶ 02 In this month of April, I recall that during President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s tenure—under whose warrant this Commission was appointed—a major massacre commenced on April 5; we speak in that somber season.

¶ 03 This is not just any report; it is about a leader who ruled like a “local Hitler.” The terrorism of that era was, in my view, state terrorism, and we are discussing a report about a state’s engagement in terror. For a decade, youths were slain. These are not easy arguments; they concern lives lost.

¶ 04 Batalanda sits on the site of the urea fertilizer factory laid in 1975 and opened in 1979, closed by 1984. Upon that site, under the stewardship of Ranil Wickremesinghe, the ground was metaphorically fertilized with the blood of our youth. Whatever names parties take today, the responsibility of those who led then remains.

¶ 05 While we focus on this central camp, there were many similar camps across districts, and death squads operated. In Matara, H.R. Piyasinghe is named as a leader; in Hambantota, Jinadasa Weerasinghe; in Moneragala, Dharmadasa Banda—the uncle of today’s SJB General Secretary. In Badulla, leaders included Percy Samarawira and Captain Seneviratne from my electorate, with his son Lakshman Seneviratne also involved. I recall these to emphasize the breadth of the apparatus.

¶ 06 We must ensure that the truth acknowledged in this Report translates into justice, and that the structures that enabled such atrocities never re-emerge.