The information in this Response to Information Request refers to the electoral campaign, election and assassination of Sarojini Yogeswaran, Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) candidate who was elected mayor of Jaffna in the 29 January 1998 elections and murdered on 17 May of the same year.

The various sources consulted describe the mayoral campaign of TULF candidate Sarojini Yogeswaran as short and low-profile. Her nomination was cleared by courts only two weeks before the election (The Hindu 16 Jan. 1998; Weekend Express 17 Jan. 1998). The Hindu described her electoral campaign on 26 January 1998 as follows:

As for the campaign per se, the late entry of the moderate TULF, traceable to a judicial reversal of the earlier rejection of its nominations, seemed to have added a new dimension. Door-to-door canvassing and "pocket meetings" (or small gatherings) featured the campaign in an overall milieu of power shortages and transport and telecommunication hurdles of untold proportions. According to TULF leaders like Mr. V. Anandasangaree and Mr. Senathiraja overseeing the party's campaign, the message being put across to the voters was that the TULF, which was only now re-establishing its political presence in the peninsula after a lapse of nearly 10 years, had "not idled away time." It was focusing international attention on the Tamil question during that period, they were telling the voters.

The race for the Jaffna municipal council, was quite intensive, with the TULF candidate, Ms. Sarojini Yogeswaran, putting up a spirited fight. Asked if she would see the Jaffna poll as a springboard to her entry onto the national political stage, she indicated that she would. In the first place, though, the "priorities" of the people of Jaffna would grab her attention. About the circumstances of her husband's killing in 1989, suspected to be at the hands of the LTTE, she said that "Sri Lankan politics has been tarnished by bloodshed" and that she had had to "take bloodshed in (her) stride."

While, on the whole, the TULF is seen by the people of Jaffna to be going soft on the LTTE question although the former is not to the LTTE what Sinn Fein is to the Irish Republican Army. This seems to be going well with sizeable sections who still see the LTTE as a factor in Sri Lankan Tamil politics. At the other end of the spectrum, a party such as the EPRLF tends to see itself as a natural ally of the TULF in the event of post-poll realignments. These local polls are, on the whole, seen by even candidates for local bodies outside Jaffna town, such as Mr. K. Balanataraja Iyer of the EPRLF in the Valigamam segment, as an opportunity for debating national issues of Tamil concern such as a political settlement of the ethnic crisis.

The Colombo Sunday Leader reported on Sarojini Yogeswaran's campaign as follows (1 Feb. 1998):

Sarojini Yogesweran [sic] was the invisible candidate who contested the Jaffna municipal council elections. For her face, her name, her symbol were absent among the political posters that covered most of the bullet-riddled walls here. It was as if she was not even in the running when compared with the smiling visage of Douglas Devananda stuck on top of most EPDP posters, compared with the red banners of the PLOTE and the equally loud signs of the TELO and the EPRLF. It was as if she was not taking this poll seriously.

Her invisibility, of course, had to do with the legal tangle her party ran into when nomination papers were filed. And there was barely enough time after the TULF was given the green light to go ahead to launch a vigorous campaign. According to Yogesweran, only three meetings were possible. The last one was held at the central bus stand in the town.

Another article states that Mrs. Yogeswaran's had "a makeshift campaign office inside the three-storey Kumaran Tourist Inn which has seen better days," adding that "her pink-coloured room has two beds for party supporters to sit on, a small table and two chairs" (AAP 28 Jan. 1998). The report adds that Yogeswaran had no armed guards (ibid.).

Sarojini Yogeswaran was killed after two gunmen stormed her house on Sunday, 17 May 1998, and fired approximately 10 shots; she was unarmed, "had turned down government offers of protection and insisted on having no bodyguards" (AAP 18 May 1998). A member of the Jaffna municipal council, "identified only as Paramasivam," was reportedly wounded in the attack (ibid.). Although various sources refer to two gunmen, one report states that she was killed "by a lone gunman" who "had come on a bicycle and then used a pistol to fire at her and then escaped" (AFP 17 May 1998). Another report states that Mrs. Yogeswaran "was meeting with townspeople when two men burst into her house and fired 10 shots," adding that "another member of the Jaffna municipal council was wounded" (AP 17 May 1998).

One news report states that an unidentified man hand-delivered a letter on the evening of her murder to a Jaffna-based newspaper stating that she was killed for refusing to step down from the mayoral post (PTI 18 May 1998). Although the letter claimed responsibility for the murder by the "Sangilian Force," the LTTE had previously warned elected candidates "in the northern local body polls not to take over power after its appeal to boycott these polls early this year went unheeded" (ibid.).

In addition to the news reports describing the assassination of Sarojini Yogeswaran available through your Regional Documentation Centre, later articles continued to attribute the killing to cadres of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE): the military considered that the alleged Sangilian Force claiming responsibility for the killing was an LTTE front (AP 29 June 1998), while the TULF blamed the LTTE directly (AFP 29 June 1998), and "Tamil civil servants in Jaffna said the guerrillas had ordered local councilors, officials and judges in the region to quit or face death" (ibid.).

Police reportedly "launched a manhunt for two suspected Tamil Tiger gunmen believed responsible" for Yogeswaran's murder, and by the next day had "questioned nearly 100 people in and around the Jaffna area" (AFP 18 May 1998).

By late June 1998 at least five councillors of Jaffna had renounced their posts following threats and the assassination of Mrs. Yogeswaran (DPA 9 June 1998; Xinhua 29 June 1998).

This Response was prepared after researching publicly accessible information currently available to the Research Directorate within time constraints. This Response is not, and does not purport to be, conclusive as to the merit of any particular claim to refugee status or asylum.

AAP Newsfeed. 18 May 1998. Oshan Fernando. "Asia: Sri Lankan Mayor Assassinated by Gunmen." (NEXIS)

_____. 28 January 1998. Amal Jayasinghe. "Asia: Widow Vows to Fight Unarmed For the Jaffna Hot Seat." (NEXIS)

Agence France Presse (AFP). 29 June 1998. "New Jaffna Mayor Takes Office Amid Fears of Rebel Attacks." (NEXIS)

_____. 18 May 1998. Amal Jayasinghe. "Sri Lanka in Major Search for Jaffna Mayor's Assassins." (NEXIS)

_____. 17 May 1998. "Sri Lankan Gunman Assassinates Jaffna Woman Mayor." (NEXIS)

Associated Press (AP). 29 June 1998. "Jaffna's New Mayor Sworn In Amid Tight Security." (NEXIS)

_____. 17 May 1998. Oshan Fernando. "Sri Lankan Mayor Assassinated." (NEXIS)

Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA). 9 June 1998. BC Cycle. "Northern Sri Lanka Courts Close Following Rebel Threats." (NEXIS)

The Hindu [New Delhi]. 27 January 1998. P. S. Suryanarayana. "LTTE Mood Key to Success of Jaffna Polls." [Internet]http://webpage.com/hindu/daily/980127/03 03270003.htm[Accessed 7 Aug. 1998]

PTI News Agency. 18 May 1998. "Pro Tamil Tigers Group Claims Responsibility For Killing of Jaffna Mayor." (BBC Summary/NEXIS)

The Sunday Leader [Colombo]. 1 February 1998. "The Sun Rises Again in Troubled North." [Internet]http://www.is.lk/is/spot/sp0230/clip6.html[Accessed 7 Aug. 1998]

Xinhua News Agency. 29 June 1998. "Sri Lanka's Jaffna New Mayor To Be Sworn." (NEXIS)

The Sunday Leader [Colombo]. 1 February 1998. "The Sun Rises Again in Troubled North." [Internet]http://www.is.lk/is/spot/sp0230/clip6.html[Accessed 7 Aug. 1998]

Weekend Express [Colombo]. 31 January-1 February 1998. "TULF Wins Narrowly in Jaffna MC—PLOTE Bags All 3 UCs—EPDP Controls 10 PSs—Last Ditch Attempt to Disrupt Polls by LTTE Fails." [Internet]http://www.is.lk/is/spot/ sp0230/clip4.html [Accessed 7 Aug. 1998]