Colombo: Ahead of the September 21 presidential election, the main Tamil minority party TNA remains optimistic that whoever wins the polls, Tamil issues could be sorted out through discussion.
MA Sumanthiran, the senior Tamil National Alliance (TNA) leader, said on Monday that the Tamil party wishes to work in cooperation with the candidate elected.
Over 2.2 million out of the 17 million registered voters come from the Tamil regions in the north and east.
The TNA, in a divided decision, has already announced to back the main opposition challenger Sajith Premadasa of the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) party.
However, the party leader S Sritharan remains committed to P Ariyanethran, who is contesting as a Tamil common candidate.
Sumanthiran said Premadasa was the candidate who gave the most positive assurance among the other candidates – the incumbent Ranil Wickremesinghe and the Marxist NPP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake to resolve Tamil issues.
During talks with TNA, all three candidates had agreed to devolve powers leading to a political solution for the Tamils, Sumanthiran said.
Asked if either Wickremesinghe or Dissanayake were to be the winner instead of their candidate Premadasa, Sumanthiran said as both had given assurances for a political solution no problems would arise.
“It is the primary focus of all Tamil parties to win over a political solution to the Tamil problems,” Sumanthiran said.
The TNA decision to back Premadasa has come under fire from the Tamil hardline Tamil National People’s Front leader Gajen Ponnambalam.
He dubbed the TNA decision as one, which is not in the best interests of Tamils, and advocated a vote boycott as the Tamils cannot take part in an election to elect a Sinhalese leader to head the country.
Earlier last month, the TNA announced to field Ariyanethran as the joint Tamil candidate. He is one of the 38 candidates in the fray.
Published 17 September 2024, 15:37 IST