Fifty three years of incomplete freedom
The fifty-third anniversary of independence falls today. The country was moving from feudalism to capitalism, and what was expected of independence was not freedom from colonialism — colonialism had produced only a modern nationalist state. National integration was the condition of real independence, and it was never met.
Need for reforms cries out loud
An unprecedented interest in the reforms good governance needs has arisen. The UNP is demanding independent commissions for elections, the judicial service, the police and the public service under a constitutional council, and K.N. Choksy is to bring a draft bill he has prepared.
A cry for democracy
The TULF’s secretary has said that democracy cannot be safeguarded by four commissions alone and that the constitution has to change as well. Ivan agrees, and goes back to the 1930s to show what the country’s democratic tradition actually contained and who carried it.
සුළු ජාතීන් පිළිබඳ ගැටලුව හා යෝජිතස්වාධීන කොමිෂන් හතර
Answering TULF secretary R. Sampanthan, who said the four commissions cannot secure democracy without constitutional change for minorities, Ivan argues that the south’s democratic demands and the north’s minority rights are two sides of one crisis, rooted in a democracy received from the British without a unifying freedom struggle. He praises the Jaffna Youth Congress, Sri Nissanka and Wilmot Perera, and recalls how the citizenship laws and Sinhala Only overrode Soulbury safeguards while Chelvanayakam lost before a dependent judiciary. He urges Tamils and Muslims to back the commissions.
මතුවී තිබෙන අර්බුදයට විසඳුම ඇත්තේ කොතැනද?
Ivan likens the President’s effort to assemble a government to collecting frogs in a basket. Rejecting Rauff Hakeem’s demand for four independent commissions within 100 days, she turned to Ferial Ashraff, whose unconditional support is splitting the Muslim Congress and the National Unity Alliance. He proposes an all-party interim government with a democratic agenda: an independent judiciary, abolition or curbing of the executive presidency, a code of conduct for elected members, independent commissions, a right to information, media reform and agreed principles for ethnic coexistence.
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.
චන්ද්රිකාගේ නව ආණ්ඩුක්රම ව්යවස්ථාව
Ivan calls the President’s constitution a scheme to keep power under the banner of an ethnic solution, as her father used Sinhala grievances in 1956. Tied to a new electoral system, it provoked the JVP, Sihala Urumaya and UNP, alarmed her own MPs, and she attacked rather than persuaded the Sangha. Using the analogy of complex surgery by an unqualified surgeon, he contrasts her with Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk, who gave up power for a settlement.
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.