By Menaka Indrakumar and Zahrah Imtiaz

Deputy Minister of External Affairs, Neomal Perera told Parliament South African Deputy President, Cyril Ramaphosa visited the country as a special envoy to Sri Lanka, to share South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) experience.

He was responding to a question on the purpose of Ramaphosa’s visit posed by Democratic National Alliance (DNA) MP, Anura Kumara Dissanayake.

Dissanayake added the government’s stance that Cyril Ramaphosa, being a South African, was in the country to watch the cricket match and tour the country, could not be accepted, given that the South African mostly visited government representatives.

“Media reports said he met the President, Minister G.L. Peiris and visited Minister Doughlas Devananda in the North. None of these look like pursuits of a tourist,” he said.

Dissanayake added that Minister Peiris had contradicted the government’s statement of Ramaphosa being here on holiday, when the minister said he had discussed the South African experience of reconciliation with Ramaphosa. Thus he asked that the government clarify the real purpose of Ramaphosa’s visit.

He also wanted to know whether the government was planning to engage Ramaphosa or the Government of South Africa as an international mediator to solve the national problem in Sri Lanka. The MP asked the minister to reveal the names of those who met Ramaphosa during his visit.

“The government passes resolutions against third parties intervening in the internal affairs of the country, so now we want to know why Ramaphosa is here”, said MP Dissanayake.

Deputy Minister Perera informed Dissanayake that the government was not planning to use South Africa or Ramaphosa as an international mediator.

“The visit was undertaken in the capacity of a mutual sharing of views on the TRC in order to explore the possibility of adopting a similar mechanism taking into account social and cultural particularities of the country. For the success of such a domestic reconciliation process the imperative need of all stakeholders participating in the Parliamentary Select Committee is required to be discussed as well,” Perera said.

He added that Ramaphosa had met President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Minister G.L. Peiris, Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva, Leader of the Opposition, Ranil Wickremesinghe, Tamil National Alliance MP R. Sampanthan, Governor of the Northern Province, G. A. Chandrasiri, and Chief Minister of the Northern Provincial Council, C.V. Wigneswaran.

Courtesy:Ceylon Today