{"id":48795,"date":"2016-10-03T23:44:46","date_gmt":"2016-10-04T03:44:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=48795"},"modified":"2016-10-03T23:44:46","modified_gmt":"2016-10-04T03:44:46","slug":"wigneswaran-is-a-politician-and-not-a-racist-who-is-trumping-up-nationalism-because-he-is-unable-to-show-results-mahinda-rajapaksa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=48795","title":{"rendered":"“Wigneswaran is a Politician and not a Racist who is Trumping up Nationalism Because he is Unable to Show Results”- Mahinda Rajapaksa"},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/p>\n

Dharisha Bastians<\/strong><\/p>\n

Former President and Kurunegala District MP Mahinda Rajapaksa took a moderate stance on issues pertaining to controversial Northern Province Chief Minister C.V. Wigneswaran and the release of Tamil political prisoners that were at odds with his usual rhetoric, in discussions with journalists from the Tamil media yesterday. <\/p>\n

Wigneswaran, the former President said, was not a racist. \u201cThe Chief Minister I know I don\u2019t believe is a racist. He is a politician. He cannot show results. Just like this Government can\u2019t show results,\u201d the former President told a group of Tamil journalists during a press meeting yesterday. <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Rajapaksa said that Wigneswaran had been unable to find solutions for youth unemployment in the Northern Province.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe has no answers. So to make people forget their problems, he is trumping up nationalism,\u201d the former President claimed. <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

He also told Tamil language journalists that he was not opposed to the release of political prisoners being held under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). Rajapaksa said the only thing he was opposed to was the Government interfering politically with the judicial process to release these detainees. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not opposed to them being released. Namal, who was in jail with them, came back and asked me, why aren\u2019t these people being released? Even to him I said that the problem was that there were cases against these people pending in court,\u201d the former President explained. <\/p>\n

Rajapaksa said that if the Attorney General\u2019s Department wished, they could withdraw the cases, or expedite them. He said that during his presidency, when he attempted to rehabilitate these detainees and release them, their lawyers had demanded that they be produced in court.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs per these wishes, I produced them in court. Otherwise by now even those prisoners would be free,\u201d Rajapaksa claimed. <\/p>\n

The former President charged that development in the North had come to a standstill since his defeat, and said the Government had failed to solve the problems of the Tamil people. <\/p>\n

\u201cAre we the only ones who didn\u2019t look into their problems? What has this Government done for them?\u201d he asked. <\/p>\n

Rajapaksa said that the Government was constantly speaking about removing the military from the North. \u201cI don\u2019t know how many troops have already been withdrawn. But tell me how many IDP camps this Government has closed? This shows me that this Government only thinks about politics, not about the Tamil people,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

Questioned on whether he believed it was still a wise move to hold the Northern Provincial Council election in 2013 given the volatile political situation developing in the North today, Rajapaksa responded that he believed it was still the right decision.
\n
\nCourtesy: Daily FT<\/em><\/p>\n

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By Dharisha Bastians Former President and Kurunegala District MP Mahinda Rajapaksa took a moderate stance on issues pertaining to controversial Northern Province Chief Minister C.V. Wigneswaran and the release of Tamil political prisoners that were at odds with his usual rhetoric, in discussions with journalists from the Tamil media yesterday. Wigneswaran, the former President said, …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘“Wigneswaran is a Politician and not a Racist who is Trumping up Nationalism Because he is Unable to Show Results”- Mahinda Rajapaksa’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48795"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48795"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48796,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48795\/revisions\/48796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}