Sri Lanka Muslim Congress

The establishment of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) in the early 1980s was a significant phenomenon in the development of Muslim politics. The party promised security and rights for the Muslims, particularly to the North and Eastern Provinces and adopted a system of electoral democracy to channel their demands (Aliff, SM. 2012: 253). Mr.

Ashraff and his Eastern Province colleagues were the major engineers / founders of the party.

Mr. Ashraff, the former member of the Federal Party led by S.J.V. Selvanayakam was very dexterous in understanding the mood of economically poor North and Eastern Muslims and employed ethno-religious slogans to lock the Muslim votes as the Sinhalese and Tamil parties do with their respective constituencies (Ibid. 2012: 258).

The SLMC clearly stressed the point that ―it was a party pledged to follow the Quran and the Sunnah‖. For Muslims, these two sources are the key guidance, and they would

prepare to do anything including hatred toward non-Muslims, if they were convinced with the arrangements pointed in Quran and Sunnah. Mr. Ashraff conscientiously understood this reality, and successfully used Islamic sources to outbid his UNP and SLFP opponents. He and his party employed the same ethno-religious strategy against the Tamils (Ibid. 2012: 259).

The SLMC had mosques as its base, particularly in the ethnically mix but politically volatile Eastern Province. The leaders of the party began their emotional political speeches and election campaigns by proclaiming Islam‘s basic teachings and Quranic verses such as

―Laelaha Illallah Muhammadur Rasulallah‖ (Allah is the One and Mohammed is his messenger). Needless to say, such emotional religious appeals attracted the economically deprived and politically marginalized North-East Muslims³⁰. It mainly identified the Tamil polity as the primary enemy of the Muslims and attempted to cohabit with the Sinhalese polity, a kind of tactic successfully employed by its South centered predecessors (Ibid. 2012).

The SLMC‘s growth and tactics had goaded the Tamil Tigers (LTTE). With this religious-ethnic emotional baggage, the SLMC contested several elections since 1988. In the 1989 parliament election the SLMC won 4 seats out of 225, in 1994 the SLMC won 9/225, in 2001 the SLMC won 10/225, in 2004 the SLMC won 11/225, in 2010 the SLMC won 8/225³¹. With the political capital the SLMC earned from the Muslim masses the SLMC primarily employed a strategy of political accommodation, a kind of strategy Colombo-centered Muslim elites adopted to win the Sinhala political class. Mr. Ashraff effectively negotiated, and won key portfolios from the Sinhala ruling parties for the SLMC (Haniffa, F. 2011: 7).

30 It was noted at the 2004 election that most of the women became the members of the SLMC than men in the North and Eastern Provinces. This indicated that the SLMC not only attracted the men but also women voters in the North and eastern Provinces of Sri Lanka.

31 If you look at the Members of Parliament (MPs) there was a slight decrease from 2004 to 2010. It was an impact due to the fraction of ACMC and NMC from the main stream of SLMC.

Mr. Ashraff and his party colleagues filled key ministerial posts such as the Ministry of Ports and Shipping, and Eastern Development as well as other significant positions in government institutions and diplomatic appointments (Ibid. 2011: 9-10). In fact, the SLMC was very successful in terms of obtaining some political benefits from the Sri Lankan government by forming a political alliance with the Sinhala majority in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The establishment of the South Eastern University and the construction of the Oluvil harbor in the Eastern Province are two of the SLMC‘s great achievements that took place under the leadership of Mr. Ashraff (Ibid. 2011: 9).

Mr. Rauff Hakeem, a key charismatic leader of the SLMC, filled the leadership when Mr. Ashraff life was concluded with a tragic air accident on September 16^th, 2000. Mr.

Hakeem who hails from the Central Province (Navalapitiya) of Sri Lanka decided to follow in the footsteps of late Mr. Ashraff with some notable flexibility. He met the LTTE leader, Mr.

Veluppilai Pirabkaran on the 13^th of April, 2002 and signed a landmark Memorandum of Understanding (Ibid. 2011: 10).

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) promised some reconciliation between the Tamils and the Muslims. But critiques did not suggest any radical improvements in the region. Muslims did not have reasons to lose the confidence in the MoU because the LTTE as promised did not take any practical measures to give back the lands (63,000 acres) they captured from the Muslims of the Eastern Province nor did it take practical measures to eliminate the fears of the Muslims towards the LTTE. On the other hand, Muslim politicians or the SLMC found difficulties to abandon their Pro-Sinhala polices, and thus contributed to the growth of Tamil suspicion towards the Muslims (Aliff, SM. 2012: 261).

Essentially, the death of Mr. Ashraff deeply disturbed the unity of the SLMC.

Several factions emerged within the party‘s ranks. Many believed that Muslim political

representatives had lost the common program to win security and rights for Muslims: they failed to win any legitimate say in the Ceasefire Agreement of 2002 as well as Post-Tsunami Operation Management Structure (PTOMS) of 2005 concerning Tsunami and peace talks.

The Muslim political elite‘s inability to make the right choices and policies to win Muslim interests largely frustrated the Eastern Muslims who had mounted their trust in the moderate democratic Muslim leadership (Ibid. 2012: 262-263).

Muslim youths from the Eastern Province believe that the major purpose of the SLMC is just to formulate policies to win public offices for themselves. There is a tendency in the Eastern Province among the Muslim youths to seek non-democratic alternatives to channel their desires. Such a tendency can be attributed to the theory, which reads the roots of illiberal movements at a point when liberal forces radically fail their constituencies. It is important to mention that breakdown of the Tamil moderate legitimacy among the Tamil masses couple with the Sinhala oppression against the Tamils comfortably opened the way for the Tamil radicalism and violence against the state and its institutions. The same could likely occur in the Muslim polity, if democratic voices of the Muslims just focus on winning perks, position and promotions for their family and members as their Southern Muslim counterparts successfully do since independence (Ibid. 2012: 265).

The key political strategy of the SLMC and other minor (Muslim-oriented) regional parties did not reflect a major shift. Both traditional and northeast political leadership believe that politics of accommodation, strictly speaking, with the Sinhala political class could pay off for their community (Imtiyaz, ARM. 2012). The SLMC was critical of the strategy and branded Muslim politicians as puppets of the UNP and the SLFP. Ironically, the SLMC adopted the same strategy of accommodation and won positions at the cabinet since 1987 and perks for their family and party loyalists. In fact, the SLMC did not adopt any new strategy, in other words, they just reformed the same old political formula with Islamic religious

rhetoric (Ibid. 2012).

In democracy, politicians and parties play major role. People could relate their grievances and problems to them. However, the function of democracy largely depends on votes. Thus, Richard Clutterbuck (1993) defined democracy as the competitive struggle for the people‘s vote. Politicians often claim they choose politics to serve for masses, but their major aim is often focus on power. In other words, politicians and leaders are ―motivated by the desire for power, and income their primary objective is to be elected‖ (Ibid. 1993: 27).

The consequences of this slyness nature likely discourage the masses to keep the trust in the system. When masses lose the trust in democratic channels, you may witness illiberal fill the vacuum and gains sympathies to outdo the political moderates (Ibid. 1993: 29).

The logic of the SLMC politics does not suggest any new shift. The same old policy to win Muslim votes, in order to secure cabinet portfolios and perks. It seems there is a slight tendency among the Eastern Province Muslims to reject such a narrow-minded politics.

Failure of democratic voices may trigger more instability and chaos. Muslims of the North and East may experience such a transformation when democratic political representations crash the expectations of the masses (Imtiyaz, ARM. 2012).

Although there are many criticisms about the SLMC and its political changes, it can still win the peoples‘ heart especially in the North and Eastern Provinces of Sri Lanka and produce certain numbers of parliament members in every election. It is noted that in the last parliament election in 2010, the SLMC won 08 seats out of 225 parliament members.

Currently, the SLMC functions as a core political party due to the political alliance with the UPFA, which started in 2011. However, when it comes to the election the SLMC often participate as a separate political party in the North and Eastern Provinces where considerable numbers of Muslims live (38%). For example, in the last Eastern Provincial Council Election

July 15^th, 2012, the SLMC contested as a separate political party and won 7 seats out of 34 in this Province. After this election the SLMC signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the UPFA government and rented their support for the ruling party in Sri Lanka. As a result the mayor of Eastern Province was appointed from the Muslim ethnic group with the help of SLMC (Ibid. 2012).