COLOMBO, Nov 1 (AFP) - Sri Lanka’s main Muslim party Monday withdrew from a peace panel set up by President Chandrika Kumaratunga and declared "all out war" against her for allegedly trying to splinter the minority community.
The Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) said it was staying away from the first official-level meeting of the National Advisory Council for Peace and Reconciliation, which Kumaratunga launched last month.
SLMC leader Rauf Hakeem said Kumaratunga had engineered the defection of three of his legislators over the weekend in an effort to change the constitution and that the move was prejudicial to minorities.
Three SLMC dissidents were sworn in by Kumaratunga at the weekend as non-cabinet ministers, boosting the strength of her coalition government in the 225-member assembly where it has a wafer thin margin.
"She wants to use our members and form a constituent assembly and resort to extra constitutional means to change the constitution and perpetuate herself in office," Hakeem told reporters.
He said the government was seeking to change the proportional representation system to reduce the number of legislators from minority parties and vowed to stage a campaign to resist the move.
"She is trying to destabilise the Muslims," Hakeem said. "We are taking her on. We are declaring all out war on her."
Muslims, who are the second largest minority after Tamils, form 7.5 percent of Sri Lanka’s 19 million population, but their block vote has considerable leverage as majority Sinhalese votes are split down the middle between two parties.
Tamils who account for 12.5 percent of the population also have a huge influence over national politics.
Hakeem, a member of the previous government’s peace negotiating team with Tamil Tiger rebels, warned that the country could head for more instability and unrest if Kumaratunga pressed ahead with changing the statute.
The government announced last week that Kumaratunga would remain in office until December 2006, a year longer than expected since she was sworn in for a six-year term in December 1999.
Government spokesman Mangala Samaraweera said Thursday that Kumaratunga’s term would end not in December 2005, six years after she was sworn in, but in December 2006.
Hakeem said the political crisis in the country was due to Kumaratunga’s desire to continue after her current term ends. The constitution allows a president a maximum of two six-year terms.
Attempts to revive talks with Tiger rebels have failed and Kumaratunga has been struggling to boost her support in parliament after narrowly winning the April parliamentary elections.
The United National Party, which was in power during talks with the Tamil Tigers and today heads the opposition, has also stayed away from the panel. Tamil Tiger proxies too boycott it.
Any political settlement with the Tamil Tigers would require re-writing of the constitution, a move that needs the support of two-thirds of the legislature.
Kumaratunga’s party has talked about forming a "constituent assembly" outside the present legal system and adopting a new statute under a "constitutional revolution."
