Armed police raided the headquarters of the Nava Sama Samaja Party (New Socialist Party) in Colombo on June 1, while the party's central committee was in session. About 30 policemen armed with automatic rifles, grenades and sub-machine guns broke into the building, saying that they suspected illegal activities.
The real reason for the raid was that the NSSP is the key organisation supporting the electricity workers' strike. The strike began on 29 May and resulted in a total blackout for four days. The whole 14,000 strong work force went on strike demanding that the government give up its plan to privatise the Ceylon Electricity Board.
This is the second time the government tried to intimidate the NSSP within a month, the first being a police attack on the May Day demonstration.
President Chandrika Kumaratunga, addressing a press briefing on May 31, vowed that she would resort to any means "short of killing" to get the strikers back to work. She declared the strike illegal and ordered the mass arrest of the strikers.
Within hours of her threat, gunmen opened fire at the main telecommunications union leader, J.B.P. Dissanayaka. He escaped unhurt, but it was clear that the attack was aimed at intimidating other public sector trade unions which have expressed solidarity with the striking electricity workers. Dissanayaka is also a leader of the public sector trade union movement opposing privatisation.
Several leading members of the NSSP have also received death threats. There had been attempts by pro-government Sinhala forces, including some members of parliament, to rouse chauvinism among the masses by staging anti-strike demonstrations depicting strikers as a hindrance to the war effort against Tamil separatists. Major General Anuruddha Ratwatte, a maternal uncle of the president, is both the deputy minister of defence and the minister for power and energy.
The NSSP appeals to all socialists and trade unionists to write or fax the president of Sri Lanka: to protest and condemn the raid against the NSSP headquarters; to protest and condemn all forms of intimidation against the electricity workers and public sector workers.
Please write or fax: The President of Sri Lanka, H.E. Chandrika Kumaratunga, Presidential Secretariat, Colombo 01, Sri Lanka. Fax (941) 333 703. Please send a copy to the NSSP fax (941) 334 822.