SLMC’s Basheer Segudawood Clarifies, Says He Called For A Muslim Unit Not A Separate State

February 29, 2016

Chairman of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) Basheer Segudawood who sparked a fresh controversy following his call for a separate Muslim state at a meeting held in Kathankudy recently, has said that his statement was misconstrued and he only called for a separate Muslim unit and not for a separate state for the community.

Basheer Segudawood

Issuing a statement today, Segudawood said, “In the said meeting, what I mentioned was, about a separated Muslim unit (MuslimAlahu in Tamil) as it is still being canvassed by the Tamil political parties for a merged North & East, as well as powers for self-determination for the Tamil community. This probably has been translated to read as a Muslim separate state in other languages. I do not perceive this to be an act of deliberation, but a mistake in translation.

However, the Tamil media has carried the news the way I conveyed,” he said.

Segudawood said that Muslims have always been for a united Sri Lanka and even when Lord Soulbury referred to the separation of Ceylon, based on ethnic identity, Dr. T B Jaya declared that the Muslims are happy to live together with their brothers as one country.

“Until the emergence of the internal war and the subsequent turbulence the Muslim community faced, a need for a separate identification politics did not arise. History has provided ample evidence to prove that the welfare of the Muslim community has been largely depending on the leaders of the country. In the past few years we have faced discrimination and adversities. The country’s leadership has been blowing hot and cold in the past, when issues of Muslim security and welfare were brought to their notice,” Segudawood said.

He also noted that whenever a call is made towards Muslim aspirations, it is referred or inter twined with “Jihad” which has never been an entity in Sri Lanka. “It is said in a fashion to portray the community as a violent race. There is no evidence on record to prove the existence of Jihad or anything similar to that has been a security threat to the state or any community any day.

This has been a ploy by a few with ulterior motives to provide ammunition to rubble rousers to have political mileage,” Segudawood charged.

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