Late last month, the Northern Fishermen’s Action Committee (NPFAC) in Sri Lanka, with the support of Socialist Equality Party (SEP), held a successful meeting in Kayts on the Jaffna Peninsula. Over 20 fishermen, including women, as well as SEP members, participated in the event which resolved to establish a local action committee.
The NPFAC, which was established by representatives from different parts of northern Sri Lanka earlier this year, is fighting to form action committees of fishermen and other workers throughout the province. NPFAC and SEP members campaigned for several days to build the Kayts meeting.
Kayts is an island located 16 kilometres from Jaffna city, connected to it by a five-kilometre causeway. Like other areas throughout Sri Lanka’s north and east, Kayts was devastated by Colombo’s 26-year communal war, which ended with the bloody defeat of the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in May 2009. According to UN estimates, at least 40,000 civilians in the north and east were killed by the Sri Lankan military during the final stages of the conflict.
Thousands of families live in fishing villages like Paruththiyadaippu, Melinchimunai and Thampaaddy across the region. During the civil war residents faced brutal repression by the Sri Lankan navy, aided and abetted by the Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP). This party, which functioned as a paramilitary formation, was led by Sri Lanka’s current Minister of Fisheries, Douglas Devananda. The Sri Lankan navy still monitors fishermen and other residents in Kayts.
Many people from Kayts were “disappeared” and killed during the war. This included SEP member Nadarajah Wimaleswaran and his friend Sivanathan Mathivathanan from Velanai in Kayts. Both were fishermen. They disappeared while returning home from Punguduthive on March 22, 2006. SEP investigations pointed to the navy’s involvement in their disappearance.
NPFAC president and SEP member Rasenthiram Sutharsan chaired last month’s meeting. “As fishermen, we have been affected by the economic crisis like other working people in the country,” he told the meeting.
“Some people face starvation; fishermen can’t go fishing because of the fuel crisis; and northern fishermen have stopped deep-sea fishing,” he continued, pointing out that fishermen cannot work because the government is not providing adequate amounts of kerosene and other necessary fuel supplies.”
The meeting discussed an NFAC statement entitled, “Build fishermen action committees to defend livelihood and democratic rights.” The statement explained the social consequences of President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s decision to implement the austerity demands of the International Monetary Fund and his government’s use of the Prevention of Terrorism Act and other repressive laws to crush mass opposition.
The statement included a series of demands related to fishermen, including abolition of all their debts, ending the oppressive military pass system for fishing and a guaranteed price for fish. It also called for the nationalisation of multinational fishing industry companies, placing them under workers’ control.