Crippled Sri Lankan constitution and the Election commissioner’s unexpected behaviour.
Posted on May 22nd, 2020
Chandrasena Pandithage
In Sri Lanka, the
most powerful unit called “people of Sri Lanka”. Nobody has a right
to stand above them. That is a law,
Country’s decision-makers are them, not anyone else. Presidents, Prime
ministers, Parliament, or Court’s duty is to work for them. Presidential
elections. Parliament elections and referendums are very important to take
people’s participation in this mechanism.
It’s very understandable about people’s power and the value of their
participation in the mechanism often. Nobody has the power to impose a
restriction on elections or referendums. All those terms were in President J.
R. Jayawardhana presented the constitution. In that constitution show the
President’s power. Nobody has the power to change it without people’s consent.
To get people’s consent, it must hold a referendum. This is the law,
President’s power remains as earlier, nobody challenges this till get people’s
consent through a referendum for 19 amendments.
People of Sri Lanka gave power to President Gotabhaya Rajapaksha with the
executive power to rule the country, and no one has a right to challenge his
executive power. Now people need a parliament election. We expect a parliament
election urgently. We do not expect any baseless arguments to delay the
election from Election Commissioner. Your duty is not to look at Covid19 to
delay Elections, make a programme for the general election. This is not a time
to play political games.