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Muslim tsunami victim files FR against Mechanism
A petition filed by a tsunami victim claiming that his Fundamental Rights had been violated by the failure to provide equal representation to all ethnic groups in the P-TOMS (Post-Tsunami Operational Management Structure) committees will be taken up for hearing in the Supreme Court tomorrow.
Mahmood Lebbe Alim Ahmad, a resident of Kattankuddy in his petition has declared that the tsunami caused substantial damages to lives and property of the Muslims. He said 41 per cent of the deaths caused by the tsunami were of Muslims while 49 per cent of the injured were Muslims.

The petitioner claimed that though the Muslims were entitled to equal rights, certain clauses of the P-TOMS would violate their rights. He has submitted that he has been subject to unequal treatment as far as the composition of the Regional Committee was concerned and that there was no rational basis on which the composition of the Regional Committee had been made as the LTTE representatives have been given dominance in the Chairmanship of the Committee.

The petitioner states that a plain reading of the composition procedure and the decision-making procedure reveal that the LTTE has been given total dominance in the Regional Committee so that the LTTE could decide by itself and implement the development strategies, prioritization of relief, rehabilitation, reconstruction and development and more particularly Fund Management in the six relevant districts, including the Batticaloa, Ampara and Trincomalee districts, where the majority affected are Muslims.

He states that the composition and decision-making mechanisms and the location of the Regional Committee have been manoeuvred and designed in a manner to discourage or abandon Muslim representation in the Regional Committee allowing the LTTE to have a free hand and unfettered discretion in the management and control of the affairs and funds of the Regional Committee.

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