The Hon. Bimal Rathnayake - Minister of Transport, Highways, Ports and Civil Aviation and Leader of the House of Parliament

¶ 01 Hon. Presiding Member, very briefly on the motion by Hon. G.G. Ponnambalam.

¶ 02 First, we have no desire to appropriate people’s private lands to the State. If we had a chauvinist intent, we would not have gazetted this during an election—because that would be politically costly. Some tried to use this during the election. But we had no such intent.

¶ 03 Second, as I have always said, we acknowledge the historical context of Tamil politics. But today, people across many provinces—Tamil, Muslim, Sinhalese—have given the National People’s Power significant support, including electing MPs from Jaffna and Vanni. Why would we take lands in those districts to settle outsiders? That argument fit earlier times; not now.

¶ 04 Moreover, this Gazette concerns all nine provinces, not just the North. Please do not view us through the Rajapaksa/Ranil prism. Cooperate with us. Though positions differed at elections, that is fine.

¶ 05 We have Cabinet concurrence. The Ministers of Agriculture/Lands and Environment are preparing a program. Especially in the North, many traditionally and privately occupied lands lack proper demarcation, causing people to lose what they cultivated. A joint Cabinet Paper by the Lands and Environment Ministers will propose a special committee to resolve and return the maximum to the people. There is no nationalist agenda here. If you heard the President’s recent speech, you would understand our policy stance. We treat all citizens fairly and equally.