Colombo deploys Sinhala Military Intelligence personnel as CEB workers in Battialoa

The occupying Colombo has employed several Sinhala military intelligence personnel as meter readers and consumer coordinators of Ceylon Electricity Board from CEB branches operating from Kalladi and Kaaththaan-kudi. These workers, entering the houses of Tamils are involved in surveillance activities, say informed Tamil civil sources at Batticaloa District Secretariat. The district has already been struggling with Colombo appointed Sinhala workers in the public sector of the Tamil-speaking district and that too when there are thousands of qualified and unemployed Tamils in the district itself. Now, the military is also intervening into the public sector through its intelligence wing, the civil sources further said.

During the times of war, before 2007, the SL military used to deploy its intelligence agents as workers in road construction and as ambulance drivers. After Colombo seized the control of entire Batticaloa district in 2007, it started to appoint Sinhala personnel to almost all the posts from medical doctors to road cleaning workers.

The latest military CEB deployment, which has come into force from March 2017, seeks to create new inroads into the society. The intelligence operatives of young age males are entering the houses and are trying to converse with Tamil girls at home, the parents have complained from Ma’nmunaip-pattu divisional secretariat, the civil sources further said.

SL military has been exerting pressure on former LTTE members and grassroots workers to collaborate with it for a long time. But, now it is deploying Sinhala personnel directly into the civil sector with a long term assignment.