නයාට ගසා පොල්ල වරද්දා ගැනීම
Ivan argues that the government’s impeachment of Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake has backfired: it expected her to resign, but the weak charges, the backing she has won from lawyers and the public, and international scrutiny ahead of the March Human Rights Council session have put it on the defensive. He lists this as the fourth clash between executive and judiciary under the 1978 system, after Neville Samarakoon’s time and Mark Fernando’s under Kumaratunga, and warns of a constitutional crisis if Parliament ignores a Supreme Court order, while noting that the judiciary is not blameless for the decline it now suffers.
ශ්රී ලංකාවේ ක්රියාත්මක වන දෝෂාභියෝග ක්රමය (විවේචනාත්මක විශ්ලේෂණයක්)
Ivan compares impeachment procedures in the United States, India, South Africa and Germany, where presidents and senior judges face the same process, with Sri Lanka’s, which makes it almost impossible to remove a president but easy for a parliamentary majority to remove a judge, since the charges against judges are heard by a select committee of MPs under standing orders. That imbalance, he argues, is why presidents need a loyal Supreme Court. Drawing on his own objection in the 1990s to being tried by Parliament for breach of privilege without a lawful procedure, he argues that Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake too is entitled to a fair hearing.
අගවිනිසුරුගේ දෝෂාභියෝගයෙන් පන පෙවෙන වත්කම් බැරකම් නීතිය
Two of the impeachment charges against the Chief Justice concern her asset declarations, and Ivan argues that whatever their merit they have revived a powerful but neglected law. He explains the 1975 Declaration of Assets and Liabilities Law and its 1988 amendment, which gave any citizen the right to inspect declarations and did not exempt the president. He recounts learning of the law from MP C.V. Gooneratne in the late 1980s, asking the Secretary-General of Parliament for MPs’ declarations, persuading G.L. Peiris, and later testing the Kumaratunga government and the Election Commissioners, and calls for the law to be updated and strictly enforced.
දේශපාලන ක්රමය සමග අධිකරණයේ බිඳ වැටීම
Ivan sees the government’s move to impeach the Chief Justice as part of the collapse of the political system. Comparing the courts of the United States, Britain and India, where the judiciary guards the constitution and the separation of powers, he shows how Sri Lanka’s constitution places the courts under the president, who appoints all senior judges, and limits their review of legislation. He criticises the Supreme Court for failing to be creative, from approving the 1982 referendum that extended Parliament’s life to its handling of the 17th Amendment, and traces the decline back beyond Sarath N. Silva to G.P.S. de Silva’s time.
අර්බුදයේ තවත් වැදගත් පැතිකඩක්
Ivan argues that the courts, which should protect citizens from abuse of power, have also helped create the crisis. After Neville Samarakoon, Justice Mark Fernando tried to carry forward a creative tradition of fundamental-rights jurisprudence until the Kumaratunga era drove him out; Ivan recounts long conversations with him after his retirement about the 1978 constitution, which Fernando helped draft with Sarath Coorey and A.J. Wilson. Citing Sarath N. Silva’s near-confession over the Helping Hambantota case and Ranil Wickremesinghe on crossovers, he argues that the courts have distorted the law, and that the bureaucracy and the rich who control governments share the blame with politicians.
801 වැනි මිනිසා
Building on Alvin Toffler’s idea that people living today are the 800th lifetime since the hunting age, Ivan calls his children’s generation the 801st, who will live in a fully globalised world. Many Sri Lankans already work abroad, bringing in over US$4 billion in 2010, and more of the coming workforce will do so. He argues that education, certificates and the whole institutional system must meet international standards, that children need an international language, information technology and freedom from chauvinism, and that governance itself must change rather than waiting for politicians to find wisdom.
අධිකරණයේ හා විධායකයේ ගැටුම
After the university teachers, Ivan writes, the stage has been taken by judicial officers and lawyers, provoked by a thug attack on the Secretary of the Judicial Service Commission, who had been publicly criticised by the President. He argues that the 1978 system copied the American presidency without its checks, giving the president power to appoint judges and limiting judicial review. Neville Samarakoon, though appointed as a friend of J.R. Jayewardene, kept the court upright; the retreat came under Sarath N. Silva, whose misconduct his successors never corrected. The judiciary, he warns, cannot defeat the government within this collapsing system.
විශ්වවිද්යාල ආචාර්යවරුන්ගේ සටන
Ivan sees the three-month strike by university teachers as another expression of the crisis of the political system. He argues that the education system itself has helped produce the crisis, turning out professionals whose self-interest holds back society, and cites misconduct by leading accountancy firms. He agrees that Sri Lanka’s spending on education, and on higher education in particular, is among the lowest, and backs the demand for 6% of national income, but warns that such demands, better salaries and depoliticised universities cannot be won within this corrupt system, which the teachers must learn to confront.
ක්රමයේ අර්බුදය උග්ර කරන පළාත් සභා මැතිවරණ
Hearing Sajith Premadasa promise better welfare for the rural poor under a UNP president, Ivan reflects that no change of president can rescue a system that has outlived its time. Prabhakaran’s defeat left the traditional political system without its enemy and exposed its decay: an economic crisis alongside lavish infrastructure spending, chaos in the energy sector, and mass recruitment of young people into state jobs to buy support. Holding provincial council elections piecemeal before their terms end, he argues, shows how deep the government’s crisis is.
යහපත් දේශපාලන ක්රමයක් සඳහා සිහින දැකීමේ අවශ්යතාව
Writing during the 2012 provincial council elections, Ivan examines the electoral system created in 1978. Quoting Election Commissioner Chandananda de Silva’s report on the 1989 election, he argues that the system hands the party holding the presidency control of Parliament and the public service, and that open vote-buying and campaigns costing billions have turned elections into auctions. He recalls watching money flow to Chandrika Kumaratunga’s campaigns and Leslie Goonewardene’s refusal of foreign funds for his party, and warns that the country’s richest people have made their fortunes by funding politicians and now rule from behind the scenes.