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Behold the budding tiger politicos
Will you step forward please, all those cynics who said that the Tigers lead-
ers would never become genuine politicians like the rest of that breed which has ravaged and savaged this country.

How gleefully they argued that the Prabhakarans of the LTTE have only lived by the sword-or to bring the old saw up to date, by the AK47-and they would never learn to be part of our political system.

These are the self-appointed pundits on international terrorism, the seminar-wallahs who lead their nomadic intellectual life moving from seminar to conference and one assemblage to another, preaching their verities to starry-eyed foreigners and locals as though it was heavenly wisdom.

But the LTTE, which likes in many ways to be at least one step ahead of its protagonists including many from among its own people, is already proving that when it comes to behaving like our venerable politicians that it can teach a lesson or two.

If what I read in this newspaper last Sunday is correct, then the LTTE has nicely domesticated itself and imbibed the local political ethos like a duck that takes to water, or should I have said a tiger to the jungle.

In a different context, Comrade Mao that great navigator who did not mind sacrificing a million of his people here and a million there in the name of the Great Leap Forward, advised his foot soldiers to mingle with the people and melt with the surroundings- like fish in a pond- so that they will not be distinguishable.

It appears that Mr Prabhakaran and his Tiger leadership have decided to take the wise words of Chairman Mao a giant step further and be a part of the local political landscape even before they had truly qualified to be members of that vocation- or should it be vacation.

Last Sunday's report says that the LTTE has claimed a vehicle belonging to a parliamentarian of the Tamil National Alliance(TNA) on the basis that the LTTE is entitled to claim this vehicle.

I am rather puzzled by the logic- if the LTTE's claim to the vehicles has been correctly conveyed. The operative word here is, of course, entitled. What I find curious is the basis on which the Tiger's claim it is entitled to the vehicle purely because it belonged to an elected TNA parliamentarian.

Is the LTTE saying that the TNA is really an extension of itself- something like the Sinn Fein being the mouthpiece of the IRA in Northern Ireland.

If that is so the TNA, as many people rightly suspected, is the tom tom beater of the LTTE and will say and do what it is asked by those who call the tune.

If such conclusions are drawn about the real role of the TNA, then no one should be faulted for doing so. there was another news story saying that R. Sambanthan, the general secretary of the TULF(a constituent of the TNA)called for fresh nominations to the postponed local elections because the LTTE might be inclined to contest the polls.

Surely the LTTE is not that timid that it cannot speak for itself. If it felt fresh nominations should be called for so it can enter the fray or that the elections are premature- as Sambanthan argues- because of the impending peace talks, the LTTE is quite capable of expressing its views as it has done on many other matters. And surely it should know best whether the elections are premature in view of the peace talks.

But the fact that the TNA has decided to speak on the subject while the LTTE maintains a vow of silence, enhances the widely-held view that it is nothing more than a mere mouthpiece or some other appendage of the LTTE.

Is that why the Tigers believe they are entitled to the vehicle? If so why go to all this trouble. All the LTTE had to do was tell Tamil Congress parliamentarian Vinayargamoorthy to deliver his BMW at the Tiger headquarters in the Wanni.

But there is something rather confusing about all this. The aforementioned BMW, which the LTTE claimed it is entitled to, did not come to it from Vinayargamoorthy according to the news report. The car was sold to a Tamil businessman. So how did this vehicle end up in the Wanni with the LTTE?.

Did this businessman, whose name remains unmentioned, give it to the LTTE for reasons we need not discuss except to say that he transports goods from Jaffna to Colombo, or so the report went.

It is good for the political system that the LTTE is learning quickly the ways of politicians so that they can't run abroad and cry discrimination. Even before the interim provincial council is discussed, let alone established, the LTTE is claiming the concessions given to MPs- such as vehicles.

As befits one who that intellectual giant Dr. Anton Balasingham claimed as president and prime minister of Eelam, the LTTE leader should be provided with one of those armoured vehicles that President Kumaratunga is keeping all to herself like a child who doesn't want to share her toys.

Even better, Dr Balasingham should use some of that money collected from the Tamil community in the UK to transport a Rolls Royce to the Wanni. Of course he will have to get something bigger than a seaplane he last used

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