JHU warns against holding polls in Lanka's northern province

An ally of Sri Lankan government has warned against holding elections in the Tamil-dominated northern province, saying polls without corrective action will legalise the distorted demography in the region.
"It is not fair to hold the northern provincial council election before corrective action with regard to distorted demography", Nishantha Sri Warnasinghe, The JHU or the Heritage Party spokesman said in the northern town of Vavuniya.
He said the holding of the election without corrective action would be equal to legalising the distorted demography in the north.
"The 1981 census showed the number of Sinhalese living in the north as 20,402 while there were 10,312 Muslims. The figures now are 746 Sinhalese and 2,648 Muslims", Warnasinghe stressed.

He said the JHU had informed both President Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Commissioner of Elections on the need to hold back the elections.
Rajapaksa has declared that he would hold the northern provincial council election in September.
The government has come under the international community to hold the election as a key step towards achieving national reconciliation with the Tamil minority.
However, the president's nationalist coalition partners warn that the election could signal the separation of the north in the event the main Tamil party, Tamil National Alliance, wins.