By Neville Ladduwahetty, courtesy The Island

The Preamble to Sri Lanka’s Constitution states: The PEOPLE of SRI LANKA having by their Mandate…entrusted and empowered their Representatives …to draft, adopt and operate a new Republican Constitution in order to achieve the goals of a DEMOCRATIC SOCIALIST REPUBLIC whilst ratifying the immutable republican principles of REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRATIC”. 

The intent of this exercise is to ascertain whether the practices as adopted by successive Governments to elect the People’s representatives are in keeping with the immutable principles of Representative Democracy”.    

According to Article 3 of the Constitution: Sovereignty includes the powers of government, fundamental rights and the franchisee”.    Furthermore, Article 3 is an entrenched article – Article 83.     According to Chapter XIV, titled The Franchise And Elections”, Article 88 states: Every person shall, unless disqualified….be qualified to be an elector at the election of the President and of the Members of Parliament or to vote at a Referendum”.     Therefore, it is the electors in the Electoral Districts as determined by the Delimitation Commission (DC) that elect the President and Members of Parliament.  

EXISTING INCONSISTENCIIES   

• The first relates to Article 96 (1).     This states: The (DC) shall divide into not less than twenty and not more than twenty-four electoral districts…”.     The reason for the upper limit for Electoral Districts is perhaps because Sri Lanka was originally divided into twenty-for Administrative Districts (now 25), and 96 (3) establishes a relationship between Electoral Districts and Administrative Districts when it states: Where a Province is divided into a number of electoral districts the Delimitation Commission shall have regard to the existing administrative districts so as to ensure as far as practicable that each electoral district shall be an administrative district or a combination of two or more administrative districts or more electoral districts together constitute an administrative district”

Despite the fact that that the Constitutional direction to the DC was that the Electoral District was to have regard to the existing Administrative District”, the number of Electoral Districts established by the DC is twenty-two (22) while the number of Administrative Districts are now twenty-five (25).     Although the provision to combine Administrative Districts into one Electoral District exists, the reason for the difference is reportedly because the DC decided to factor in issues, such as land which is extraneous to franchise thus compromising the sanctity of franchise and the sovereignty of the electors.     On the other hand, if the Electoral District is coterminous with the Administrative District, not only would it protect the elector’s Franchise but also enable the elected members to address the administrative interests of the electors.      Would such an opportunity not give substance to the immutable republican principle of Representative Democracy”? 

• The second inconsistency relates to Article 96 (4).      This states: The electoral districts of each Province shall together be entitled to return four members, (independently of the numbers which they are entitled to return by reference to the number of electors whose names appear in the registers of electors of such electoral districts), and the Delimitation Commission shall apportion such entitlement equitably among such electoral districts”.

Consequently, the four members to be returned from each of the nine Provinces amounts to thirty-six additional members, shall be apportioned equitably by the DC among the twenty-two (22) Electoral Districts together with the one hundred and sixty members from the electoral registers, thus making a total of one hundred and ninety-six members being elected through the franchise of the electors.      The balance twenty-nine through the National List nominated by Political Parties is also elected by the electors, thus making a total of two hundred and twenty-five (225) Members of Parliament elected through Electoral Districts.  

The irony however, is that although Members of Parliament are elected through Electoral Districts, all Executive Powers of the Line Ministries of the Central Government are implemented by the District Secretaries in the twenty-five Administrative Districts.     The present convoluted process of appointing a Parliament through Electoral Districts and administering its functions through Administrative Districts cannot be justified.     What would be more meaningful is to make Administrative Districts also perform Electoral functions such as appointing the Members of Parliament.

• The third inconsistency relates to the election of Members for Provincial Councils.     According to the Provincials Councils Act: Every administrative district in a Province shall for the purposes of elections to the Provincial Council established for that province, constitute an electoral area” 

This is a departure from the practice adopted to elect Members to Parliament since they are based on outcomes from twenty-two (22) Electoral Districts.      Therefore, it is worth exploring why Members to Parliament and Provincial Councils cannot be elected using the existing 25 Administrative Districts.  

RECOMMENDATIONS  

The intention is for an arrangement where Administrative Districts are also assigned electoral functions, so that both Members to Parliament and Provincial Councils could be elected by a single unit.      The advantage would be that   Administrative Districts could carry out Central Government functions under a District Secretary as at present, a parallel unit within the Administrative District could be set up to implement devolved powers in each of the Administrative Districts, while retaining the existing structural arrangements of Provincial Councils.     This would facilitate the coordination of devolved powers with Central Government activities, thus improving productivity of each. 

CONCLUSION   

The current practice is that while representative of the Central Government of Sri Lanka is elected by Electoral Districts as stated above, Provincial Councils in the periphery with less powers than the Central Government are elected by electors in Administrative Districts of each Province.     If elections to Parliament and to Provincial Councils are elected by electors in each of the twenty-five Administrative Districts, perhaps one election could elect Members to both bodies.     

In view of the significant cost savings involved, it is imperative that serious consideration is given to equip Administrative Districts to serve as Electoral Districts for Parliamentary Elections as well as for Provincial Council Elections, since such an arrangement would further fortify the immutable republican principle of Representative Democracy”.     Furthermore, since such an arrangement would be closer to the People, services to them would be better served.