Outlook for minorities remains bleak - Farzana

Farzana Haniffa, Head of the Department of Sociology at the University of Colombo has said in a Colum to Aljazeera that several anti-Muslim measures are been taken by the current government .

 

Hanifa, points out that several prominent Muslims have also been arbitrarily targeted by the government, with little or no evidence produced of their wrongdoing. In April 2020, the police arrested Hejaaz Hisbullah, an activist lawyer, on suspicion of aiding the attackers. Then in May 2020, Ahnaf Jazeem, a young Muslim poet, was also detained under the same pretext. Recently, the former leader of the Jamati Islami, Hajjul Akbar was arrested and detained for a second time, again without charges being filed.

 

The Colombo university academic further points out that  the current government’s inability to mobilize its constituency around anything other than ethno-religious animosity is a legacy of Sri Lanka’s post-independence politics that looks set to continue in the long term.