No, plate tectonics is based on heat from the earths mantle.

Think of tectonic plates as part of a cracked shell that all fit snugly together over the earth's molten mantle.

Heat from radioactive processes within then causes the plates to move.

For your story, it would be a piece of your planets cracked shell being removed and the molten stuff underneath exposed. I can only imagine the massive devastation as the rest of the plates try to move to fill in the gap.