Sri Lanka’s minority parties launch common platform for shared concerns

Prominent political parties representing Sri Lanka’s Tamil-speaking ethnic minorities have launched a platform to voice shared concerns around the pending political solution to the island’s national question and the persisting challenges to their communities’ land rights.  

Addressing a press conference in Colombo on Monday (July 13, 2026), leaders from political parties and alliances — currently in Opposition — representing Tamils of the north and east, Malaiyaha Tamils of the central and southern hill country, and Muslims across the island said the effort was aimed at foregrounding key issues facing the Tamil-speaking communities of Sri Lanka.  

Leaders of the All Ceylon Makkal Congress (ACMC), Ceylon Workers’ Congress (CWC), Democratic Tamil National Alliance (DTNA), Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kadchi (ITAK), Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC), and the Tamil Progressive Alliance (TPA) outlined three key areas of focus – introducing a new Constitution, early conduct of the long-pending provincial polls, and addressing conflicts surrounding people’s land.  

“Operating within the broad national framework of Sri Lanka’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and based on principles that the rule of law be upheld and human rights and democracy be protected, this platform seeks to voice concerns pertaining to the people who have given us a mandate to represent them,” said SLMC Leader and Member of Parliament Rauff Hakeem. “This should not be interpreted as an anti-government or a pro-opposition stance,” added the MP, currently aligned to the main Opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB, or United People’s Power).  

NPP manifesto

Pointing to the ruling National People’s Power (NPP) coalition’s August 2024 poll manifesto —  subsequently adopted as the government’s National Policy Framework — that promised the introduction of a new constitution, building on the constitutional reform process that began in 2015, and the conduct of Provincial Council elections within a year, the opposition leaders said the Anura Kumara Dissanayake administration was yet to move on either. “Based on these two pledges, we urge the government and the President to act on these two demands without any further delay,” said TPA Leader and legislator Mano Ganesan.  

Further, the government must take steps to resolve land grabs in the island’s north and east, carried out by state agencies including the Archaeology and Forest Departments as well as the military, the politicians said. “The question of land concerns all three groups,” said ACMC leader and MP Rishad Bathiudeen, referring to the north and east, where sizeable populations of Tamils and Muslims live, and the hill country that is home to Malaiyaha Tamils.  “In addition to voicing shared concerns over land rights, this platform also gives us a chance to discuss and iron out differences among us over land rights,” said Vanni MP Selvam Adaikkalanathan of the DTNA, in an apparent reference to conflicts over land between Tamil and Muslim communities in the north and east.  

The NPP secured a two-thirds majority in the November 2024 general elections, outperforming regional parties in the north, east and hill country, except in the eastern Batticaloa district, where it lost the first spot to ITAK. Its success in areas with a large population of ethnic minorities, following a campaign that steered clear of ethno-nationalist or racist propaganda, pointed to a significant shift in the voting patterns of Tamils and Muslims, who appeared willing to give President Dissanayake’s government a chance. While his administration has taken some steps to address land rights — although welcomed the efforts are widely seen as inadequate—it has indicated that reviving the country’s battered economy will take precedence over constitutional reform. 

Need for equitable solutions

The Opposition parties did not adopt a confrontational tone towards the government but made their dissatisfaction clear. “There is no point in pushing this false narrative that we are all Sri Lankans without addressing long-pending concerns and shortcomings in areas where Tamil-speaking people live. We need equitable solutions,” said Jeevan Thondaman, MP and General Secretary of the CWC.  

ITAK General Secretary and former MP M.A. Sumanthiran described the coming together of parties representing the country’s Tamil-speaking people as “historically significant”. 

“Of course, we have a history of working together, our party was formed on the cusp of the disenfranchisement (1948) of Tamils of Indian Origin,” he said, recalling the association of iconic hill country leader late Savumiamoorthy Thondaman with northern Tamil leaders, as well as SLMC founder M.H.M. Ashraf’s support of the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF)’s election campaign in 1977. “Majoritarianism is an enduring challenge in Sri Lanka. This is an effort to bring together representatives of numerically minority communities to highlight our shared concerns,” Mr. Sumanthiran said.