Tagged: SPUR

A key amendment adopted by Sri Lankan parliament last week is only a halfway measure towards abolishing executive presidency as only 60 to 65 per cent of powers of the top post have been reduced, according to an architect of the legislation. 

“The government itself has gone public saying that it could not go the full distance,” Jayampathi Wickramaratna, a constitutional lawyer who was involved in drafting the 19A, said. 

President Maithripala Sirisena said yesterday that unity of all communities was the only way for a better future. He also stressed the need to strengthen the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).

Addressing the SLFP May Day rally at Hyde Park, the President said he used his powers only for the good of the people and promised to do anything for the future of the country.

He said that he would ensure the fundamental rights and human rights in the country at a level that no foreign agency could lay any blame.

“I will show a better human rights situation within a year and will not allow the international community to accuse Sri Lanka of violating human rights,” President Sirisena said.

There were four main winners in the battle over 19th Amendemnt. Of them, the second biggest winner was President Sirisena who was able to retain much of his power while balancing adroitly between the two contending components of his power base: his ally the UNP and his party the SLFP. The biggest winner however, was not President Sirisena. It was a dead man, President Junius Richard Jayewardene. His 1978 Constitution proved so robust a structure, that it successfully resisted the joint attempt of his distant nephew Ranil Wickremesinghe and his old rival Sirimavo Bandaranaike’s daughter Chandrika Kumaratunga to upend its center-piece, the executive presidency.

Power that the people had given go to President Maithripala Sirisena was being used by others, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa said on Saturday.

The former President, addressing a Daham Hamuwa, at Kacchiwatte Purana Rajamaha Vihara in Galle said: “I was told by one of the participants at this ceremony short while ago that during my tenure the number of members in the cabinet was high but now the number of executive presidents in the country was high. There is some truth in that saying. There is a national executive council. There is no provision for such a thing even in the Constitution. That council has become a play pen of the JVP and TNA members. The JVP has become a branch of the UNP today. Not all the JVPers approve this situation. JVP leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake has a room in Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s office. That was revealed to our members none other than the incumbent president. Although I cannot believe this, we have to accept it when it is said by the President!