The increasing use by the Government of the armed forces under the Emergency conditions as a means of beating down the working class movement had, on the Government's own admission, the outcome which the LSSP had repeatedly foretold. A military police group had been tempted to plan a conspiracial seizure of governmental power. Wide arrests of leaders of the working class movement were an integral part of their plan.
It would appear that the plan was discovered accidentally and that the Government was able by use of other sections of the military and the police to arrest a number of conspirators and suspects at a late stage. Undoubtedly, not all the conspirators have been discovered, nor have all the ramifications of the conspiracy been unearthed. The danger of further adventures organised from the same reactionary quarters continues unabated.
The Government continues to persist in the policies which really created the situation and the opportunity for this attempt. The prolonged Emergency regime gave the police and the military special powers and an increasingly important position in the day-to-day administration. Further, the direct resort to the military in the attempt to break the harbour strike and other strikes, and the placing of the military at various key points in the economy and administration in the effort to beat down the working class movement, left the Government more and more dependent upon the armed forces for the maintenance of itself in power.
Moreover, the working class which is the only organised force in Ceylon capable of giving immediate battle to military-police usurpers and of mobilising the entire masses in resistance, has been deliberately deprived by the Government of the necessary freedom of action. Democratic and civil liberties have been suppressed. The right of public meetings and demonstrations has been denied, a censorship has been clamped down on the press and on publications, strikes have been made illegal and the Government has taken, and is exercising the power to imprison strikers without trial.
If further coup attempts are to be prevented this situation must be ended forthwith. It is futile to rely on the military and police to counter military-police conspiracies. The people of the country cannot leave it to the military and the police or even to the Government to protect their democratic and constitutional rights, and civil liberties against conspiratorial military-police attacks. The administration must be cleared of the armed forces, and normal civil administration restored. The regular armed forces must be withdrawn, and the volunteers and pioneers withdrawn. Negotiations to settle the current strikes and strike issues must be commenced. The democratic and civil liberties of the people must be restored. In short, free the people to defend their rights.