Reforms process: it’s a matter of trust
If Tamil and Muslim people saw the President’s attempt at a new constitution as a genuine effort to settle the ethnic question, its failure must pain them. And if she had succeeded, it might have brought not a solution but bloodshed between communities — because the thing missing was never the document.
ශ්රේෂ්ඨාධිකරණය කොතරම් දුරකට ස්වාධීනද?
The editorial argues that Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva is serving the President’s political aims, as seen in government-related cases and the proposed 17th Amendment to change the electoral system. Unlike earlier amendments heard by the most senior judges, this bench excluded the four seniors and constitutional experts Mark Fernando, A.R.B. Amerasinghe and Ranjith Dheeraratne, and allowed a change that would give the alliance 201 of 298 seats and the JVP none without a referendum.
වැරදුණු කුරුමානම
Ivan argues that the government’s rushed new constitution was a cover for entrenching the executive presidency and a mixed electoral system of 298 members. The plan was to win minority parties with the ethnic settlement, buy about nine to sixteen UNP MPs, and rely on a Supreme Court under Sarath N. Silva to waive a referendum. Public opposition across ethnic lines scattered the defectors and forced its withdrawal, which he calls the country’s good fortune.
එදා ජේ.ආර්. කල දේම අද චන්ද්රිකා කරයි
Ivan compares the government’s rush to enlarge Parliament to 281 seats with 168 elected by first-past-the-post, avoiding a referendum through a court ruling, with J.R. Jayewardene’s attempt to keep Abeyratne Pilapitiya in Parliament after losing the Kalawana election petition. Then the Supreme Court ruled that adding even one seat required a referendum and Sarath Muttetuwegama took the seat. He estimates buying the nine UNP votes needed for two-thirds would cost about Rs 180 million.
පරමාධිපත්යය සමග
The editorial describes how the 209-page draft constitution was printed on 30 July, approved unread by the cabinet on 31 July and sent to the Supreme Court as an urgent bill without gazetting or public comment. A constitution is a social contract, it argues, not an emergency law like that passed after Sepala Ekanayake’s hijacking; South Africa received some four million public submissions. With no public debate and votes being bought, the new constitution will deepen the country’s problems.
Playing with the sovereignty of the people
The printing of the draft constitution finished on Sunday 30 July and it went to the cabinet on the 31st. Every minister approved a 209-page document none of them had read, because there had been no time to read it. On 2 August it went to the Chief Justice.
ආණ්ඩුවේ සිහින ලෝකය සහ යථාර්ථය
Ivan explains the government’s plan to switch to a first-past-the-post system by using the urgent-bill procedure to obtain a Supreme Court ruling that no referendum is needed. He argues the court cannot allow a change to the constitution’s foundations without one, recalls the distortions of the 1970 and 1977 results that led to proportional representation, and notes that minority parties, the UNP and the JVP oppose it, so the government will have to face the election under the existing system.
අගමැතිනියගේ හතළිස්වැනි අගමැති සංවත්සරය
Marking forty years since Sirimavo Bandaranaike became the world’s first woman prime minister, the editorial honours her but questions her holding office at 84 when her health prevents her from performing the duties of a post that, though diminished, still answers to Parliament and acts for the President. Citing Roosevelt and Mandela on fitness for office, it calls the practice a waste of public money and an indignity to her, and notes the similar case of bedridden deputy minister P.B.G. Kalugalla.
A self-created impasse
The average number of votes a candidate needed to become an MP was 35,305 in 1994 and 32,492 in 1999. From that arithmetic the column works forward to the impasse the government has built for itself, and to what the courts could and could not do about extending a parliament.
සිය කැමැත්තෙන් හිරවීම
Ivan calculates that even repeating its presidential vote would give the People’s Alliance and allies only about 115 of 225 seats under district proportional representation, and 103 if its vote fell ten percent. Intra-party preference contests make rigging harder, hence the push for a mixed system, which needs a two-thirds majority, a referendum and six months. A hostile Parliament could elect the Speaker, impeach the President or cut her funds, a trap of the President’s own making.