UNITED NATIONAL FRONT’S NOMINEE TO THE UN POST OF SECRETARY GENERAL DISGRACED BY HIS OWN PARTY AND LEADER
By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles
April 11, 06.00 AM:Ranil Wickremesinghe government’s official nominee, to the prestigious position now held by Kofi Annan, the United Nation’s Secretary General was disgraced by his own party, when the same leadership changed his mind and failed to appoint him as a national list MP of the United National Front in the Sri Lanka Parliament.
The fall of Tyronne Fernando came together, as Lakshman Kadirgamar who was criticized by him severely for carrying on an international campaign with India to ban Tamil Tigers once again became Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister, with the routing of Fernando’s party at the last general Elections.
More than two years ago, when the Ranil Wickremesinghe government came into power, speaking about Ranil Wickremesinghe government’s new foreign policy he said , his predecessor Lakshman Kadirgamar did a terrible mistake by going on a campaign internationally urging the terrorist group Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam be proscribed. His government’s new foreign policy was based on the new principle of not urging foreign governments to restrict the activities of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
Anyway, commentators in Colombo said he was also in the unfortunate position of not having a full control of his ministry with Prime Minister’s kitchen cabinet including Ministers like Milinda Moragoda constantly interfering in the affairs of the Ministry. For instance, Washington’s ambassador Devinda Subasinghe, a political appointee was not his choice.
Criticizing Lakshman Kadirgamar , he told the pro-UNP/LTTE weekly the Sunday Leader, which was published on January 20, 2002, that, “Former Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar went on a campaign internationally urging that the LTTE be proscribed, little realizing that it would boomerang on the country one day when it had to de-proscribe the LTTE, for a meaningful solution.”
The United National Front government of Ranil Wickremesinghe , surely de-proscribed the LTTE, making way for governments like the one in Canada , to make that country the collection center of foreign funds for LTTE armament purchases but the “meaningful solution” Tyronne Fernando was speaking about never came, with the LTTE walking away from the peace negotiations .
Now renegade tiger commander Col. Karuna has claimed that LTTE Supremo Prabhakaran had wanted them to delay the peace talks for another five years until he fully equipped his army for another major war for separation.
Reporting Tyronne Fernando’s interview the pro-UNP/LTTE newspaper said, “ Tyronne Fernando says he does not want to make the same mistakes. He wants to have a broad based foreign policy and believes, the Tigers should be offered an alternative if they are ready to drop their claim for a separate state.”
Although nobody both in Sri Lanka and abroad took Fernando seriously about his ambitions about the UN post until the last moments of his government he was campaigning with the consent of his Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on capturing the top post of the United Nations , as Kofi Annan ends his second term in the year 2007. The New York Times said he was the least known among all other candidates.
In his interview with the Sunday Leader, Tyronne Fernando said, ““We must have an open and broad based approach to international relations. I think the last seven years have been marked by an obsession to ban the LTTE and militarily fighting terrorism without a modern, practical and constructive approach to politically negotiating an end to the war.”
In the hard hitting interview against Tyronne Fernando said, “So much so that the former Foreign Minister became a prisoner of the LTTE. He had to live in a fortress, not attending the Ministry at all, getting down people to his house guarded by 125 soldiers, unable to move around in the city without 12 cars. We wanted to change all this and first of all removed all the barricades he had put up because he is no more Foreign minister.”
““ (T)hey had an undue obsession about annihilating the LTTE. What I am trying to say is that this ethnic problem is a local problem. It is not something that a Foreign minister should totally get immersed in.”
A commentator in Colombo said, “It is a sad comment on the quality of judgment and selection process of the UNP that people considered unsuitable to be sent to the local Parliament via the National List should have been given serious consideration in the first place as fit for stewardship of one of the world's most difficult administrative posts.”
