Why they were arrested in the first place, whether they had links with the defunct LTTE, whether the arrests had anything to do with the nature of the political climate, and whether forces associated with the deep state were behind these arrests.
What we hear from the police is that they have been charged with the possession of materials linking them to LTTE. However, we have yet to hear evidence of financial transactions and about the conspiracy to attack the Sri Lankan High Commission in Kuala Lumpur, as mentioned by the police officer at his press conference.
One of the persons who was arrested was involved in an attack with some others against the Sri Lankan high commissioner a few years back. They were charged and convicted for this assault.
Even before the expiry of the 28 days, as required by the Security Measures (Security Offences) Act 2012, or Sosma, the police charged those detained and, for some, additional charges were imposed.
Meanwhile, DAP lawyers have sought a habeas corpus application in the High Court to free the detainees.
Tamil nationalism
LTTE engaged in a bloody civil war with the Sri Lankan government for 30 years. However, in May 2009, the final and ultimate military push against LTTE resulted not only in the decimation of the outfit but the deaths of more than a hundred thousand Tamil civilians.
In 2009, LTTE was decimated, its structure dismantled and its overseas sources of funds dried up. LTTE was gone, it merely remained in the minds of Tamils who sought to remember the organisation for nostalgic reasons more than anything else.
I don’t understand why the fear of LTTE was invoked to ban it in Malaysia in 2014, five years after LTTE was buried and gone. Why was LTTE not banned when it was fighting in the civil war in Sri Lanka?
Apart from a small segment of Tamils who kept the memory of LTTE alive in symbolic ways, there was no threat posed by those who had nothing but nostalgia for the Tamil nationalist movement.
It must be remembered that Tamil nationalism spans thousands of years and just cannot be reduced merely by LTTE’s armed conflict, which lasted about 30 years. It is not that violence was the sole monopoly of LTTE. Long before its emergence, there were historical conflict and violence between the Tamil and Sinhala kingdoms on the island of Sri Lanka.
Discrimination of Tamils
Following independence, Tamil political parties were formed to agitate for reforms to improve the lives of Tamils. However, the Sinhala racist state forbade any meaningful reforms resulting in the nullification of Tamil peaceful agitation.
It is wrong to say that violence or armed struggle took place when LTTE emerged in the late 1970s. For more than two thousand years, there was violence between the Tamils and Sinhala. The armed struggle of LTTE was the direct result of the extreme exploitation of Tamils, discrimination of Tamils in universities, introduction of the quota system with the Sinhala only policy, and more extreme anti-Tamil riots in Colombo and other places.
Historical antecedents
The flag or the tiger emblem of LTTE was not its own making. It was taken from the Chola, Tamil kings who ruled Sri Lanka about 2,000 years ago. The word “Eelam” is not something original to LTTE. It was a name derived from the past and assigned to the traditional Tamil homeland in parts of Sri Lanka, particularly the north and east. The word “Eelam” is commonly found in Tamil literature dating back to thousands of years. Again, the word was popularised by LTTE as the name for the new Tamil state to be established in the future.
Post-LTTE
The annihilation of LTTE has changed the course of Tamil history in Sri Lanka, from one of armed struggle to one of democratic struggle, with the support of the international community. Whether the Tamils will obtain some form of autonomy or seek an independent state will all depend on their political strategy. However, one thing is certain, the armed struggle option is no more there.
Tamils, having endured more than 30 years of hardship and suffering under conditions of civil war, are not in a position to undergo another 30 years of intense struggle. Tamils are not in position to accept another armed struggle.
What revival?
So, what revival of LTTE are we talking about? Tamil enthusiasm for identity and nationalism cannot be simply reduced to LTTE. The end of LTTE is not an end to Tamil nationalism but the beginning of another phase under particular circumstances of the post-war period.
Tamils in Malaysia or elsewhere might have fond memories of LTTE. They might have gatherings and war memorials in remembrance of the past, but such symbolic or nostalgic gatherings do not signify the revival of LTTE but slowly letting go of a period in Tamil political history.
Brochures, pamphlets and photographs of LTTE leaders do not mean that those arrested have links with LTTE, but there is no LTTE to have links with in the first place. The arrests of the 12 individuals have nothing to with the revivalism of LTTE.
These individuals have nothing to do with what is happening in Sri Lanka. There is no LTTE revival in Sri Lanka, particularly in Tamil areas.
Dubious terror charges
The Malaysian police might not have made a terrible mistake. The LTTE threat perception has been overblown for some other reasons. The political demonisation of the DAP by its political enemies might have coincided with the actions of the deep state to fling into action.
Let us not forget that the LTTE bogeyman episode would not have arisen without the arrival of the Indian fugitive preacher Zakir Naik. The move to neutralise the opposition to Zakir Naik could have activated the designs of the deep state and those powerful figures bent on producing a particular outcome.
What is regrettable is the role of the Attorney-General’s Chambers in approving the charges of the police against the 12 individuals.
If the European Union could delist LTTE some years ago for not posing a threat, and the US for not even naming LTTE as a source of potential threat or danger in the recently released country report on terrorism, the Malaysian government seems to be caught in a peculiar kind of entrapment that keeps LTTE “alive”.
In the final analysis, the recent arrests might suggest that there is some degree of instability in Malaysian politics. It is only too familiar to us that under conditions of political instability, threats are invoked to arrest individuals who might have nothing to do with political tensions leading to instability.
Satees Muniandy is the Bagan Dalam assemblyman and international secretary, DAP Socialist Youth.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.