As part of its campaign efforts ahead of local government polls this week, Sri Lanka’s National People’s Power (NPP) party released a series of Tamil songs, full of nationalist and pro-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) sentiment.
See the translation for one of those songs, based on Valvettithurai, the birthplace of LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran, below.
The song, which pledges to construct a bronze statue of Prabhakaran, features his childhood home and criticises other Tamil parties, has been shared by NPP supporters and officials.
O the land that yearned for valour,
O the soil where Tamil pride has flourished,
The land where History was born
And gave the nation its National Leader,
O the land that yearned for valour,
O the soil where Tamil pride has flourished,
The land where History was born
And gave the nation its National Leader,
O our soil, O Valvettithurai,
O our soil, O Valvettithurai,
When will the land that's the Tamils' identity
Be self-sufficient?
When will our lives change with facilities
The rival the world?
To date there is no development
Demon politicians who forgot honour
Demon politicians fattened by corruption
Red shawls and white vettis,
And lap dogs that follow,
As they swept up,
O our nation lies bare!
Those with the fish emblem,
and those with groups with the conch,
Mercenaries with the elephant emblem,
Those (inaudible) carrying the deer emblem
O land that yearned for valour,
O soil where Tamil pride has flourished,
The land where History was born
And gave the nation its National Leader,
Those with the house emblem,
they sold their Tamil people
The cheating clowns
with the cycle emblem,
Do we still want them
They owe us explanation
Do we still want them - (for because of them)
Decimated are the Tamils' lives
The political drama
that took the the National Leader's quest
for the Tamil nation
and destroyed his vision
O we have had enough
They owe us explanation
It is they who took us all the way
to Mullivaikkal
O we have had enough
They owe us explanation
It is they who took us all the way
to Mullivaikkal
You have no seats in parliament
You have no support of the people
You have no seats in parliament
What business do you have in local government?
The world will come to see
Uthayasooriyan Kite Festival
The tourism industry will
be the envy of this world
The world will come to see
Uthayasooriyan Kite Festival
The tourism industry will
be the envy of this world
We will build ports - we
will build factories
We will give peppercorn interest loans
to self employed
As out town grows towards the sky
AI and IT our youth will conquer
O our soil, O Valvettithurai,
O our soil, O Valvettithurai,
O the land that yearned for valour,
O the soil where Tamil pride has flourished,
The land where History was born
And gave the nation its National Leader,
In the name of Veluppillai Parvathy Ammal,
A new harbour shall rise,
And it shall echo our history for a hundred years
it shall echo our history for a hundred years.
The NPP will deliver that
The ideology of the NPP and
that of the National Leader are one
A bronze statue of the Tamil national leader
Shall rise in the land of his birth.
We shall build a memorial hall,
And install the bronze statue,
That will be the first resolution
in the urban council
Across the land
Maveerar Thuyilum Illams shall be rebuilt and preserved
—A duty to be borne by the councils.
No matter how many years pass
The identity of the Tamil people shall endure;
And the national party shall uphold it.
Rishes will come to our land
Gone will be poverty
Tax burden will fall
Whole nation is with Anura
Our minister Chandrasekar,
and the seven NPP representative in the north
Will say the name of NPP for five years
Our lives will leap by fifty years
Thodaimaanaaru, Aathikovilady, Polikandy, Revady,
Sivan temple in Valvettithurai, Kammonthurai, Maliyanthanai..
Our votes will show the way
Our votes are for the compass
Our votes are for the compass
Fate rests on your finger tip
Fate is on your finger tip
Fate is on your finger tip