The 2019 Presidential Election and the aftermath
Two brothers, two minds: Victor Ivan argues that Mahinda Rajapaksa for all his faults kept a civilian outlook, and that what would follow a Gotabaya victory is government by the barracks.
A questionnaire for presidential candidates
Nine questions Victor Ivan puts to every presidential candidate — on national security, the assets law, schools, garbage, the killing of journalists, and whether a new constitution will be written by MPs or by the people.
Mr. NOTA and understanding the Presidential Election
India gives voters a ‘None Of The Above’ box. Victor Ivan proposes Sri Lanka field Mr. NOTA as a candidate in his own right — a vote for a new constitution rather than for any of the men on the ballot.
Ignoring the main problem
The 19th Amendment stripped the president of executive power but left the office elected as if nothing had changed. Victor Ivan argues the country keeps patching its errors instead of correcting them.
Avoiding essential reforms
The surface fire is out; the fire under the ashes is not. Victor Ivan compares Sri Lanka’s failure to build a nation with Gandhi’s approach in India, and asks why the necessary reforms are still being avoided.
The crisis and constitutional violations
Every branch of the state has broken the Constitution, Victor Ivan argues — and he traces the habit from the disenfranchisement of the plantation Tamils under Soulbury to the amendments that followed 1977.
The reality of Nagananda’s Constitution
Nagananda Kodituwakku’s ‘autochthonous’ constitution would let every incoming ruler write his own, Victor Ivan argues — a recipe for constitutional chaos dressed up as home-grown independence.
Making way for a people’s constitution
A numbered case for taking constitution-making out of the hands of a Parliament that Victor Ivan judges incapable of passing an ordinary Act, let alone founding a state.
Crisis of the Constitution
The 19th Amendment stripped the president of executive power but left him elected as though he still held it. Victor Ivan calls the result a country without a working constitution — and warns against going to the polls before fixing it.
Next choice of Sri Lanka, a People’s Constitution
Forty-six people’s organisations met in Colombo on 19 January and agreed how a new constitution should be framed. Victor Ivan sets out that consensus and the international-law argument for participatory constitution-making.