Ex-MP Ariyanethiran named as Tamil Common candidate

Tamil political parties and civil society outfits have named former MP P. P. Ariyanethiran as the Tamil Common Candidate for the upcoming Presidential Election today in Jaffna. 

The decision to name former Ilankai Thamil Arasu Katchchi MP as Common Candidate was taken after several rounds of grassroots-level discussions both in the Northern and Eastern provinces.

The move to field a “common candidate” from the community, according to political parties and civil society outfits is to register their disappointment with the failure of successive governments to resolve the longstanding ethnic problem even 15 years after the end of the war.

At least seven political parties and seven civil society outfits signed an MoU on July 22 at the Thanthai Selva Auditorium in Jaffna to form the “Tamil Peoples General Council”.

The MoU was signed by Selvam Adaikalanathan of the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO), C.V. Wigneswaran of the Tamil Makkal Kootani, D. Siddarthan of the People’s Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE), N. Srikantha of the Tamil Nationalist Party, Suresh Premachandran of the Eelam People’s Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF), P. Iyngaranesan of the Tamil Nationalist Pasumai Movement, and S. Venthan of the Democratic Cadres Party.

Civil society activists included T. Vasantharajah, S.C. Jothilingam, Prof. K.T. Kanesalingam, and R. Wigneswaran, along with political analysts A. Jatheendra and M. Nilanthan.