දර්ශනයේ දුප්පත්කම
A reply to C.A. Dissanayake’s Ravaya article defending limited constitutional reform, which Ivan links to Dr Jayampathy Wickramaratne’s thinking. He questions who ‘Dissanayake’ really is, rebuts his account of J.R. Jayewardene’s Second Amendment to the 1972 constitution, which created the presidency, and argues that the executive presidency changed the whole character of Parliament: the old MP elected by a small constituency served the people, while today’s MPs, chosen under preferential voting, depend on money and patronage.
අධිකරණ අර්බුදයේ ගමන් මග
The government set out to fight Shirani Bandaranayake alone, but now faces judges and lawyers united against it. Answering the claim that Parliament is supreme and beyond the courts, the piece argues that Parliament’s powers are limited by law and that even a humble employee may not be dismissed without due process. It recalls the 1984 Samarakoon inquiry, when S. Nadesan and the Civil Rights Movement protested and opposition members agreed that a lawful procedure was needed, and the Kumaratunga government’s 2000 draft constitution, whose Article 151 provided a proper procedure for removing judges, and warns that without such reform the country faces anarchy.
අහෝ පාර්ලිමේන්තුව
Ivan condemns the one-sided procedure by which Parliament’s select committee has pursued Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake. He recalls the 1984 inquiry into Chief Justice Neville Samarakoon, when S. Nadesan argued that Parliament had no lawful procedure for trying a judge, and India’s Judges (Inquiry) Act of 1968, and explains how Parliament gained and then voluntarily gave up judicial power over privilege, citing his own privilege case in 1992. He lists eight faults in the present inquiry, from charges without supporting evidence to no list of witnesses and undue haste, and predicts that the President’s unease will embolden those resisting.
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.
පාර්ලිමේන්තුවේ පරිහානිය හා එය ජයගැනීම
Ivan’s submission to the parliamentary select committee on the conduct and discipline of MPs. He cites a survey in which only 12% of people trusted Parliament, and traces the decline through land grabs and permits, thugs and private militias, and black money in elections, contrasting today’s spending with the limits of 1965 and 1970. He recalls the L.M.D. de Silva and Thalgodapitiya commissions, which led to MPs being expelled, and argues that the assets and liabilities law should be enforced, with declarations published on a parliament website. He also proposes a German-style mixed electoral system instead of the plan of the Dinesh Gunawardena committee.
සටන් කිරීම හා අවසාන සටන
Ivan sets out the principles that let him win most of his battles: a just cause, a clear philosophy and plan, careful assessment and preparation, and knowing when not to fight, as Gandhi refused to hamper the Allies in wartime. He recalls how J.R. Jayewardene ordered him to stop his ‘Kalinga’ column during the second JVP insurrection and how a calm reply won the President’s respect; how he refused JVP requests for help and armed protection, backed the state against the rebels though opposed to the UNP, and saw every such crisis as no time for regime change. He contrasts Gandhi’s respect for his opponents with the hatred driving Sri Lankan struggles, then tells how he defeated the parliamentary privileges committee’s power to punish journalists by refusing its summons, enlisting Mrs Bandaranaike and international pressure, until the committee adjourned indefinitely.
අනුරුද්ධ රත්වත්ත
Anuruddha has died, and as a man who was close to him for a time Ivan thinks it important to set down a note about him. What follows is a personal account, including the plain observation that neither Anuruddha nor Chandrika appears to have had full confidence in the other when she was brought into the SLFP.
නීති ඇති කිරීම හා ප්රජාතන්ත්රවාදය
The much-argued bill for the revival of underperforming enterprises and underutilised assets passed its first reading by a majority of 76 — 122 for and 46 against, with two parties in the government abstaining. That shows there is no common agreement about this law even inside the government, and the vote against was well short too.
විරුද්ධ පක්ෂ හා ආණ්ඩු පක්ෂ දේශපාලනයේ ශ්රාස්ත්රීය දුගීභාවය
Ivan opens with a telephone conversation with an educated man of some standing inside the UNP who is himself a subject of argument there, and the question he put to him. What follows is an account of the intellectual poverty on both sides, of the deceiving of party members, of family politics, and of the limits of the forward vision on offer.