MR urges Govt. to abandon ‘destructive proposal’
Posted on October 16th, 2017
Courtesy The Daily Mirror
Former president Mahinda Rajapaksa in a statement today, urged the government to abandon what he described as ‘the destructive proposal’ for a new constitution.
He said the vast majority of Tamil and Muslim people lived outside the Northern and Eastern Provinces and therefore the carving out of federal units based on ethnicity or religion and the conferring of sweeping powers on such units should never take place in this country.
The government has tabled in Parliament, proposals for a new constitution. The constitutional reform pledges made by the yahapalana coalition at the last presidential election was restricted to changing the system of elections and abolishing the executive presidential system. This government never received a mandate to repeal and replace the existing constitution. We are completely opposed to the following proposals made in the interim report of the Steering Committee of the Constitutional Assembly.
It has been proposed that the Sinhala word ‘ekeeya’ be retained in the Sinhala version of the proposed new constitution, while the English word ‘unitary’ will be dropped from the English version together with the conceptual framework it denotes. Thus the local population will be under the impression that Sri Lanka still remains a unitary state, but in the eyes of the international community, we will be considered a country that has relinquished unitary status. That such chicanery can even be contemplated is indicative of the mentality of the people driving this constitutional reform process.
The intent behind these reforms is made clear by the proposal in page four that the northern and eastern provinces be considered one province. Furthermore it has been proposed that the territory of Sri Lanka which is described in Article 5 of the present Constitution as consisting of the 25 administrative districts named in the relevant Schedule, be instead described in terms of an unspecified number of provinces named in a Schedule rather than the specific number of districts – which gives an indication of the intent behind these proposals,” Mr. Rajapaksa said.
October 16th, 2017 at 1:05 pm
All the negative aspects re the proposed new Constitution are clearly stated here.
We thank former Pres Mahinda Rajapakse for clarity.
October 16th, 2017 at 3:29 pm
Mahinda must realise now the reason for this “destructive proposal” is the 13th amendment. We all blame JR for agreeing to that evil, divisive amendment that is the cause of all these problem. Obviously LR had a reason to be scared of that thug Rajive after the parippu drop. Bur Mahinda had the best opportunity to repel the 13thy amendment when all the patriotic Sri Lankans were behind him after the decisive war victory by calling a referendum. As a very senior officer told me after the war” violence can be always defeated by violence, but not the war the Tamil diaspora is fighting now”. Why did Mahinda leave it for the likes of Admiral Sarath Weerasekara ?. Even now it is not too late for him to stand up and show real leadership.
October 16th, 2017 at 6:32 pm
MR’s govt has successfully done the most difficult part of the events for Lanka. They went to war with the terrorist group the LTTE and removed them.
MR’s time in office was like JR’s time in office – INDIA ruled.
If INDIA agrees, then the ILLEGAL 13-A can be removed.
Will eariier colonised INDIA agree ? It was during the Cold War times that INDIA imposed the 13-A on the pro-west JRJ govt.
After the war with the LTTE finished in 2009, the MR govt was not in the good books of the west. This is because some countries in the west wanted the war stopped. That did not happen – instead, the MR govt fortunately went out and finished the war, as we all know. So, MR was not in a good position to negotiate the removal of the 13-A.
Currently, if the 13-A is to be removed, we imagine first INDIA, next the UN, and the west as well must agree to that.
The Yahap folk are in the ‘good books’ of all these entities, so they are in the best position to get the ILLEGAL 13-A removed.
October 16th, 2017 at 7:20 pm
“Currently, if the 13-A is to be removed, we imagine first INDIA, next the UN, and the west as well must agree to that.”
If this is true, we are not a soveriegn nation.
I fully agree with Sarath W. There is no other ‘destructive amendement’ than 13th Amendment introduced by force by India. With the military solution given, there is no other problem to solve. Next important and easy thing to do would have been removal of 13 A. If that had neen done, this evil govenrement cannot do any harm. One cannot behave as if he can rule forever. Important work to be done has to be done without any delaly.
When JR introduce 13 A , it was soon after we lost more than 5000 soldiers and almost finsished it. MR sacrifices another 25000 and kept the very evil 13 A as it is.
It is not Admiral Sarath who should go to UN, it is the man himself who should take the lead, keeping in mind the waste of Sinhala boy’s live on a war which in the end is completely wasted.
October 17th, 2017 at 2:41 am
Currently, if the 13-A is to be removed, we imagine first INDIA, next the UN, and the west as well must agree to that.- Correct but all these are want to implement 13A fully now so what RW/MS can do just obey them specially Big brother India unless Our Velu back to kick out them than start Eelam war V !!!
which one is better choice ???
October 17th, 2017 at 5:55 am
We don’t need anyone’s approval to remove 13A. It can be done by a patriotic and visionary leader. The problem is we never had one since 1987.
The biggest challenge faced by the nation is 13A. A leader is someone who can and will abrogate 13A. Mahinda is not that leader as he failed to remove 13A.
October 17th, 2017 at 12:00 pm
An Opinion :
Removing the 13-A is the challenge to the entire Nation of Sri Lanka.
No one lead person is probably willing to do it alone as today’s Leaders are wise to the games going on.
If the Yahap, who are the blue eyed boys right now with the powers that be, are unwilling to it, the entire leadership of Lanka must join up to remove the ILLEGAL 13-A.
That way, it may really happen and the ILLEGAL 13-A kicked out.
Question to ask :
Why are people shy to make the Yahap govt kick out the ILLEGAL 13-A ?
October 17th, 2017 at 7:25 pm
Dilrook’s question – Why are people shy to make the Yahap govt kick out the ILLEGAL 13-A ?
Unfortunately, it appear like I am on some kind of blacklist, so this comment may not even be read by anyone. Anyway I know that at least one important persson will read it, even at a later time.
Mahinda Cintanaya in 2005 had a hint of opposition to having ‘homelands’ to various races, it should be aiming at 13 A. In 2013 JHU had some intention , but somehow it too faded away.
http://www.dailymirror.lk/29450/jhu-bill-to-repeal-13th-amendment
Besides this NO ONE has ever thought about this lately.
Therefore Dilrrok’s question is unrealistic, unless JO or MR ask the governement to do it. But only perwson still pushing for it in the MR campa is Nalin de Silva , who was recently attacked viciously by most MR Koombiyos.
October 17th, 2017 at 11:46 pm
When the my3 & RW duo see the ground swell against them this proposal will surely be postponed or delayed for some other time, but carry on doing other damages detrimental to the majority. One moronic minister is now talking out foreign labour including IT personnel from other countries. I am not surprised that this minister is favouring the foreigners as it was them who led his campaign in his area. During the election time I saw from my cctv (in Colombo central area) some white women pushing a trolley and putting some leaflets to my mail box. Immediately afterward I opened the box to see there was a leaflet with his picture.
These politicians want to bring in foreigners and perhaps give the voting rights for them and their families so that unp can stay in power for ever. IT is a field where SL is getting a significant amount of foreign exchange, but there is no shortage as there is a steady production of graduates from our institutions. The motive obviously is to increase their voter base. Instead of sending our women to ME as housemaids and young men to East Asia as unskilled workers why not give them training and absorb then into our workforce. In the country where I work they built a large complex to give vocational training to thousands of their youths at a time. The building of the complex took only one month and training has already started. This is the sort of things GOSL should do if they want to solve labour shortages.
October 18th, 2017 at 3:02 am
Aloy has stated a very good case for training local Lankans in skills that the country requires. Thank you.
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Let us see if the UNP leader is truly PATRIOTIC. He has all the clout now to remove th 13-A – will he ?
I doubt it … his heart is in the River Thames area & the idu … along with CBK. Stealth ops galore to ‘Crash & Sell’ Lanka.