Unemployed Tamil graduates stage protest in SL militarized Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 December 2011, 18:13 GMT]
Hundreds of unemployed Tamil graduates Friday held a protest in front of the office of the SL Colonial Governor of Northern Province Maj. Gen (retd) G.A.Chandrasiri demanding immediate employment and condemning the lethargic attitude of the Colombo government in providing employment opportunities to the graduates in the North. The demonstration commenced from Va'n'nai Perumaa'l Kovil the city of Jaffna went through Stanley Road and Kandy Road to the final destination in Chu'ndukuzhi where the SL Governor’s Secretariat is located. Around 500 unemployed graduates participated in the protest. No government appointments are made in the North between 2005 till 2010, the protesters complained.

The SL Police had deployed riot squad in front of the Governor’s Secretariat.

The demonstration was peaceful and without any incident.

Around 6,000 graduates are unemployed in the North.

“Action should be taken immediately to provide employment to them, easing their untold sufferings. Vacancies existing in the state sector in North should be filled in a reasonable way and not through backdoor influence”, a representative of unemployed graduates demanded.

Sometime back, volunteer teachers working in Ki'linochchi district held demonstration in front of the Governor’s Secretariat demanding permanency.

Earlier, the SL government had been citing the war as the reason for the failure to provide permanency to volunteer teachers.

However, volunteer teachers in other parts of the island were absorbed into permanency and appointed as assistant teachers.

The successful rally by the unemployed graduates, amidst the prevailing conditions of threat by the SL military, is a testimony to the will power of the civil society to fight for their rights, political observers in Jaffna said.