Jaffna citizens cynical of upcoming polls

It has almost been three-and-a-half years since the Jaffna Municipal Council (JMC) was dissolved; longer than the other local government bodies in the island. But those who expect some excitement among the local populace of the possibility of finally having an election would be disappointed.

"There was not much pressure to hold the elections in these areas; we did not have the opposition parties pushing for it here," noted Pt Pedro Institute of Development Principal Researcher Dr Muttukrishna Sarvananthan.

His observations are reflected in the sense of apathy shown by the people themselves. M. Vaseegaran (42), a three-wheel driver working in the Jaffna city, perceived the exercise of one’s franchise a futile effort.

“They are all corrupt. What is the point in voting for anyone? We earn for ourselves and look after our means. There is no party that works,” he said.

His colleague, R. Prem (37), agreed with him: “People only come to talk to us during election time. Look at our streets. They are so dirty, garbage piled up everywhere. We have to work in this environment.”

The Jaffna Municipal Council area consists of 90,279 people living within its borders (Divisional Secretariat Jaffna and Nallur, 2013). At the last local government election held in 2009, only 22,280 voters turned up to vote though the number of registered voters was 100,417 (Elections Commission, 2009). This time around, it is generally expected that more will turn out to vote but the question is, what do they expect from their local government authority?

Garbage

When the people were asked what they thought the most important task of their local government was, they said it was garbage. As garbage littered every street corner, drain and market place in Jaffna city, the inefficiency of their local government authority was all the more apparent to all.

The upcoming polls, however, has stirred some action.

“In the last two months, the authorities came and cleaned up the upstair section of the building. For many years, that was neglected and was being used as an open toilet and garbage dump by many. Our shops below used to smell so bad. We complained many times about it through our trade association here, but nothing happened. But in the last two months, they finally cleaned it up,” said K. Rajani (37), an owner of a shop in the Jaffna market complex.

The vendors within the open market however have had no such luck. One of the main tourist spots in the city, the market where all visit to purchase produce unique to Jaffna has at its heart - a garbage dump.

Vendors whose stalls were right next to it, complained that it made working difficult there and often discouraged customers from visiting their stalls. The question of how hygienic produce sold next to it is was another concern.

“All officials are the same; they have kept the garbage inside, where we sell our goods. There is also no security for this market, by 5 pm the guards disappear. We have to undertake all the upkeep even though we pay tax for this market,” said M. Sivakumar (40), a vendor at the Jaffna Market.

“When we constantly complain, they eventually come and take the garbage, but later come back with more. We have been having the same garbage problem for the last three years,” he added.

Looking at the prospect of the upcoming polls as an opportunity, he said, “This time we need a change. If the rules are enforced, we will stick by them, the place is so run down now and nobody cares for it. There is zero administration here.”

Jaffna Municipal Council Commissioner, R.T. Jayaseelan has been at his post for the last two months. The Commissioner is all powerful in the absence of an elected body, but he is defensive when it comes to the garbage problem,

“We collect garbage from 5.00 pm to10.00 pm but during the morning hours, the shops pollute so you will see garbage all over if you walk around in the morning,” he said when questioned on the issue.

“There is also a court case regarding garbage disposal, so we cannot do anything about it; so we have to work within those constraints,” he added.

In the absence of a political leadership, the people have found it hard to voice their opinions to the JMC and push their case through. But according to the former JMC Commissioner, Ponnampalam Vageshan, they have tried their utmost to be both mediator as well as executioner.

“The elected council ended its term at the end of August 2014. I went to JMC in September 2015 and completed two years and 2.5 months of service as the Municipal Commissioner,” he said.

Steering through the challenging times, Vageshan explained that whilst the 25 respective branch heads looked after the functioning of various departments, overall accountability and responsibility fell on the Commissioner.

“If the Mayor, council and standing committees are there, they attend to people’s requests and demands. Then, the decisions taken are communicated to the Commissioner for implementation. During my period, I had to attend to requests and needs of the municipal citizenry. It was a challenge actually in view of limited resources. However, I and my team were cautious enough to deliver non-discriminative service,” he said.

“During budget preparation, I opened ways to get maximum inputs from the public. Community centres were approached. Public petitions and letters were considered. There was a newspaper advertisement that invited public budgetary inputs.”

“In October 2017, I sent a team to all 47 grama niladhari divisions to meet the public and get their inputs to prepare the Local Authority Participatory Development Plan. The earlier plan lasted for five years and lapsed. The JMC's intention was to update or produce a new plan for another five years. In 2016, I formed the Advisory Committee comprising prominent personalities in the city. It was through a proper recruitment procedure by public notice. They advise the council voluntarily or on my request. The first Advisory Committee worked well,” he continued.

This was also a period where the JMC took the initiative to open up and invite public participation into the JMC through modern technology.

“I kept all local newspapers informed about JMC activities. The JMC has taken all positive and negative criticisms positively. The official website (www.jaffna.mc.gov.lk), in all three languages, has facilities for people to send their complaints/suggestions/proposals. Last August, the JMC started an official Facebook account under the name of ‘Yalpanam Manakara Sabhai’. People, especially youngsters, have joined and have actively been in it as ‘followers'.”

“In addition, the JMC issued a handbook on its services to residents with Assessment Notices. The handbook includes the Municipal policy frameworks on road construction and water supply connections formulated by us.”

The question, however, is how far such consultations and Facebook engagements reached the ordinary people. On the street, the people only look to the council for garbage collection - a scheme which, according to the JMC website, costs Rs 92 million.

Vageshan, however, stressed that during his tenure he focused highly on Municipal Solid Waste Management (MSWM).

“The JMC conducted several awareness programmes in schools to promote segregation of garbage. We opened five Recyclable Waste Collection Centres. All look similar so as to be identified easily. We revamped the compost making plant and registered the brand name for the JMC compost, ‘Veeriyam'. We have started putting segregation bins in public places. A plastic and polythene recycle plant was opened. The recyclers from the South entered into an agreement with the JMC. We have succeeded in an attempt of bringing PPP (Public Private Partnership) in waste collection from shops, hotels and restaurants.”

“People were often informed about JMC initiatives on MSWM and their role via newspapers, web and social media. Public littering was monitored and culprits were spot fined or brought to legal action,” he highlighted.

The segregation bins today however are filled with all kinds of garbage, with only the colours signifying that garbage needs to be separated there. The efficacy of their awareness programme among the general public thus needs to be looked into further.

Despite his efforts, Vageshan noted that it was always best to have an elected local authority run the show.

“People’s representation is a must for a local authority. The revenue amount collected does not matter here. The right personalities in a council will definitely find means and ways to improve their administrative area. The people need to be heard through representatives they elect.”

“Therefore, participating in local polls is not only about exercising their franchise, but it is also about having someone from their neighbourhood amplify their voices and take it even to Parliament,” he said.

The purpose of local government

Whilst the local representative would be motivated by the election cycle to deliver on at least some of the deliverables rather than a public servant, Prof Rajan Hoole, academic and human rights activist based in Jaffna, felt that the community still lacked understanding of the role of the local government authority.

“Here too they speak of the same issues; of self-determination, missing persons, lands, etc…we don’t seem to be taking on local government issues,” he said.

“There is rubbish littered everywhere, it is not collected on time, our natural reserves are polluted, but you see very few people protest against these,” added Prof Hoole.

“In Kandy I hear they have a good waste collection programme. Why cannot we do it here?” he asked, as he pointed out that even the local civil society or university hardly paid attention to issues of the environment or local governance.

“The same old parties are contesting again and I don’t think there will be a change because people do not expect much. Change won’t happen unless there is an articulated protest movement here but there isn’t,” he further observed.

Dr Sarvananthan concurred with Prof Hoole and observed that even the political parties contesting in the area were speaking of national level issues at the local government election.

“Many also believe that if Tamil politicians at the national level cannot achieve anything, they can do very little at the local level,” he added.

“However, what they do not notice is that interior roads, protection of wells, rain water harvesting, garbage collection, etc. are done by the local government and not the centre,” explained Dr Sarvananthan.

And despite the shortcomings, he observed that the local government in the last few years had undertaken the building of interior roads and the provision of fertilizer and other assistance to farmers. “So we see a break from just mega projects to smaller things that affect people day to day,” he said.

As work continued even in the absence of a political authority, Dr Sarvananthan observed that the Commissioners have been successful in ensuring that life continued in Jaffna.

But the JMC is a symbolic win for all Tamil parties contesting, he added.

The election

Thus far only six election related violations have been reported from Jaffna, according to the Elections Commission. The offenses involve misuse of government property, violation of media guidelines, one unauthorized meeting, illegal pasting of posters and one case of intimidation.

This, according to Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Jaffna District MP E. Saravanapavan is a welcome change from the election environment of 2009.

“People were scared to vote in 2009, elections were held under the dictatorial leadership of Mahinda Rajapaksa and Douglas Devananda. We could not even find contestants, we had to force people to contest because they faced all kinds of threats and people were being killed,” he said.

“This time is different, we have a democratic environment and there is no doubt that the TNA will win the JMC and the other 16 councils in the district,” he added.

Saravanapavan noted that people were now more interested in development and expected at least a 70-80 percent voter turnout at the election.

The 2009 election had the United Peoples’ Freedom Alliance (UPFA) lead by the Eelam Peoples’ Democratic Party (EPDP) score 13 seats, Ilangai Tamil Arasu Kachchi (ITAK) gain eight seats, an independent group one seat and the Tamil United Liberation Front win one seat.

EPDP leader Douglas Devananda, speaking to the Daily News, however remarked that the people would continue to vote for his party having seen how the TNA has failed to deliver results to the Tamil people at the national level. “Whichever government, we have not neglected the people, we work for them,” he said.

He explained that at the last general election EPDP scored only one seat into Parliament because the people were confused over his party running independently of the UPFA, “This time it is much clearer,” he added.

The EPDP, he said, also had the advantage of appealing to all in a society strictly based on caste.

The most significant change during this election however would be the significantly higher number of women contesting the polls, thanks to the 25 percent mandatory quota for women.

Women’s right activist, Udayani Navaratnam (39) believed that there would be a change in the local government as most parties have chosen female social workers at the grassroots to run for them.

“We believe that the women will be able to achieve more, at least they will be able to work for the higher number of women in the area,” she said. The Jaffna district is estimated to have 20,000 women headed households.

Problems, she feared would come after these women are elected into the local body.

“Many female candidates are scared that even after they are elected, if they oppose any legislation in the council, there would be personal attacks hauled against them,” said Navaratnam.

The women coming forward are also from lower income backgrounds, which means that at times, they are also the breadwinners of the family. Being a councillor does not pay much and thus the five years in power would take a massive hit to the family’s economy.

Despite these concerns, the women have come forward and according to Navaratnam, are more focused on local issues unlike their male counterparts.

“They have lived through the war, they know the issues the community faces day to day, so they want to change things,” she said.

Dr Sarvananthan in the meantime believed that gender will stand for the women at the election.

“We have had female leadership in the past. People will not shy away from voting for a woman, we have seen that they can work,” he said.