'' கிழக்கை மீட்டவர்களின் '' சாயம் வெளுக்கிறது.

கிழக்கில் பக்சபாசிஸ்டுக்களினதும் இந்திய விஸ்தரிப்புவாத அரசினதும் சாயம் வெளுக்கிறது.
கிழக்கு மாகாணத்தை விடுதலைப் புலிகளின் ஆதிக்கத்தில் இருந்து விடுவித்ததாகக் கூறி இலங்கை அரசு விழா கொண்டாடி ஒராண்டு ஆன நிலையில், மீட்கப்பட்ட பகுதிகளில் மீள்குடியேற்றம் செய்யப்பட்ட மக்கள், அரசு தங்களுக்கு அளித்த பல வாக்குறுதிகள் நிறைவேற்றப்படவில்லை என்கின்றனர்.
விடுதலைப் புலிகளுக்கும் இலங்கை இராணுவத்துக்கும் இடையே நடைபெற்ற கடுமையான மோதல்கள் காரணமாக பச்சிலங்கேணியில் உள்ள
பள்ளிக்கூடக் கட்டிடங்கள் கடுமையாக சேதமடைந்துள்ளன. கட்டிடத்தை சீரமைக்கும் நடவடிக்கைகள் தற்போது மிக மெதுவாகவே நடைபெறுவதாக
அங்குள்ளவர்கள் தெரிவிக்கின்றனர்.
முறையான பள்ளிக் கட்டிடங்கள் இல்லாததன் காரணமாக, தற்காலிக கொட்டகையின் கீழ்தான் பல பள்ளிகள் மீள் குடியேற்றப் பகுதிகளில்
நடைபெற்றுவருகின்றன. கோடைக் காலத்தில் தகரக் கூரைகளின் கீழ் உட்கார்ந்து படிக்கும் மாணவர்களின் உடல் நலம் பாதிக்கப்படுவதாக ஆசிரியர்கள் கூறுகின்றனர்.
ஷெல் தாக்குதலில் பெரிதும் பாதிக்கப்பட்ட வீடுகளில் மக்கள் தொடர்ந்தும் வாழ்ந்துவரவே செய்கின்றனர்.
லலிதா மலருக்கு சுனாமிக்குப் பிறகு மூன்றரை லட்சம் ரூபாய் செலவிலான வீடு கட்டித் தரப்பட்டது. மோதலில் பெருமளவில் நாசமான இந்த வீட்டை
சீரமைக்க அரசிடமிருந்து உதவி கிடைக்கவில்லை என்கிறார் இவர். வேகமாக காற்றடிக்கும் போது வீடு இடிந்து விழுந்து விடுமோ என்ற அச்சம்
இருந்தாலும், தான் தனது குழுந்தையுடன் வாழ வேறு இடம் இல்லை என்கிறார் லலிதா மலர்.

நன்றி: புகைப்படங்கள், அடிக்குறிப்புகள் பி.ஒ.கூ.தமிழ் (தமிழோசை)

Engineering ethics, Sampoor power and civilian trauma

by Rajan Hoole
________________ ''In Sampoor 16 000 people were shelled out from a very fertile area, killing 350 persons, to grab 700 acres for a power plant. It was so simple. They were Tamils! '' -Rajan Hoole

_________________________________

When we passed out as engineers in the early 1970s, it had been impressed upon us that an engineer was not only a decision maker, but also fully responsible to the
community at large for his actions. Those of us at Peradeniya were confident that our faculty gave us the best possible training in the world and we would do her
proud in anywhere we served. At the Engineering Students’ Union we were able to discuss communally divisive issues, like language-wise standardisation, amicably. I
remember many of my Sinhalese colleagues while agreeing that this was wrong, held that genuine social handicaps should be redressed. We had good reason to be
proud as a group.
Bombed and shelled out
On installing a coal power plant on land from which the people of Sampoor were bombed and shelled out in August 2006, your journal quotes a CEB official evading
the humanitarian issue by treating it a fait accompli - the Government declaring it a High Security Zone with the people’s access barred. This is a shoddy means of
exonerating CEB engineers from complicity in a crime against humanity. A range of international covenants, statutes and advisories make this clear. Article 4 of the
International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights says ‘deportation or forcible transfer of population without grounds permitted under international law, in the form
of forced displacement by expulsion or other coercive means from the area in which the persons concerned are lawfully present, constitutes a crime against humanity’.
Codes of ethics for engineers make their duty clear. The code of L’Ordre des ing‚nieurs du Qu‚bec (OIQ) puts it succinctly: “In all aspects of his work, the engineer
must respect his obligations towards man and take into account the consequences of the performance of his work on the environment and on the life, health and
property of every person.” The CEB’s discovery that that Sampoor is the most feasible spot for coal power was not based on any objective evaluation. Less than a
month after capturing Sampoor, the Power and Energy Ministry simply announced that at the request of the Army and Navy commanders, the location of the power
plant has been switched from China Bay, a predominantly Sinhalese area, to Sampoor (Daily Mirror 3 Oct.2006).
Illegal pretext
Under the cover of war, the HSZ is being used as an illegal pretext to tamper with the area flouting accepted procedures that include parliamentary approval,
environmental impact assessment, proper alienation of land and compensation. The Defence Ministry is far exceeding its authority and competence in shoving people
around and making permanent changes to their lives and environment. A plan drawn up in 2004 designated the area for eco tourism, now arbitrarily thrown out by
military fiat.
In the case of the Norochcholai coal power plant, after the first feasibility study in 1997, the CEB had to go through a long phase of negotiation with the people
concerned. In letters to the two presidential candidates on the eve of the 2005 presidential election, the CEB Engineers Union argued that the land had low fertility,
only 73 families would be displaced and no more than 258 acres are required.
A compensation package was also discussed. Had instead the Government declared an HSZ in Norochcholai, would the CEB have regarded its obligation to the
people and environment annulled?In Sampoor 16 000 people were shelled out from a very fertile area, killing 350 persons, to grab 700 acres for a power plant. It was so simple. They were Tamils!
The authorities kept changing their story even as the people were chased by shelling. Soon after the capture of Sampoor in early September 2006, military
spokesman Brigadier Samarasinghe indicating the people could return, said: ‘the threat posed by the LTTE to the Trincomalee harbour and the adjoining naval base
was no more following the successful operation involving the three forces.’ The President affirmed that the Government took Sampoor ‘purely for the benefit of the
people’. The present military spokesman Brigadier Nanayakkara now ascertains the civilians cannot be allowed back because the LTTE would infiltrate and threaten
high security installations like Trincomalee Harbour and Prima Flour Mills!
Here we have in a nutshell the cyclic rationale for the development of Trincomalee: Plant some installation, push the Tamils out for security reasons, use the space for
more installations, push remaining Tamils further for the same reason and so on. There are really no plans to defeat the LTTE, when it is so handy a pretext for
decimating the Tamils and pushing them around for bogus security reasons. Bogus, because until 1996 the Army was in Sampoor and under Colonel Udayakumara,
relations with civilians were good and the Army helped them to farm. The place was considered so unimportant that the Army vacated it.
Such were ‘development’ plans from the early 1980s, to implement which hundreds of Tamils were killed by the Army and scores of Tamil villages in Trincomalee
laid waste. Engineers in the Mahaveli Authority became part of the scheme. Mahaveli System L was planted in ‘Weli Oya’ on murder and expulsion. This was also
the time the LTTE began massacring Sinhalese civilians. Far from development, what resulted was a war that has lasted a generation and this Government cannot
survive without it.
Human and engineering disaster
The Accelerated Mahaveli Project was a human and engineering disaster. The project billed for rupees 55 billion in the early 1980s, enflamed a war costing annually
rupees 200 billion. Development of Trincomalee is a must, but not under the bloody legacy of today’s Unitary Sinhalese State. It should be done after a federal
political settlement where the people affected are adequately consulted.
Engineers have a irrevocable obligation to the ‘public good’, which the Institution of Civil Engineers UK stipulates “encompasses care and respect for the
environment, and for humanity’s cultural, historical and archaeological heritage, as well as the primary responsibility members have to protect the health and well being
of present and future generations.” What is going on is a plan to obliterate the heritage of Tamils in and around Trincomalee. Engineers should not bring their
profession into disrepute through complicity with, what at the core, amounts to creeping genocide.
(Rajan Hoole is a Martin Ennals award winning rights activist)
Posted by FEDERALiDEA on June 7, 2008 10:49 PM