The Embassy of Sri Lanka in Washington D.C. hosted the Sri Lankan Scout Contingent of about 150 participated at the 24th World Scout Jamboree held in West Virginia, the United States from 22 July 2019 – 02 August 2019, at the Mission premises.
Warmly welcoming the Sri Lankan scout contingent, Ambassador Rodney Perera appreciated the honorary services extended by the Sri Lankan scout contingent during the Jamboree, by way of promoting Sri Lankan identity, heritage and cultural values as well as Ceylon tea and tourism among over 45,000 members of the World Scout Movement.
Committee Member of the World Scout Movement and Deputy Chief Commissioner of the Sri Lanka Scout Association, Mr. Janaprith Fernando; International Commissioner and Team Leader, Mr. Kapila Perera; Commissioner, Media and Public Relations, Mr. Prabath Kularathne; and International Service Team member, Mr. Kandasamy Jeyanathan expressed their views on activities involved with the Sri Lankan scout contingent during the Jamboree, and in particular the effort exerted to promote the trademark Sri Lankan product, tea among a large number of participants.
Master Hewa Gallage Hasiru Damsara, the youngest member of the Sri Lankan scout contingent at the age of fourteen, shared his valuable experiences gained during the Jamboree with the audience.
Following the welcoming ceremony, a dinner was served to the scouting contingent prepared by the staff of the Embassy.
A group of Sri Lankan descent American youth performed a traditional Kandyan Drums Orchestra at the 10th Annual Cultural Celebration organized by the South Asian American Employee Association of the U.S. Department of State on 01st of August 2019.
Performances by youth from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Pakistan also added glimmer to this annual South Asian cultural celebrations.
The Ambassador of Sri Lanka to the U.S. Rodney Perera and Embassy officials participated at this event, while Ambassador Alice Wells, Acting Assistant Secretary, Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs and Ambassador Atul Keshap, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs were also present.
The youth Kandyan drummers were trained by Mr. Indika Aththanayake, founder of Sri Lanka Bera” in Maryland, U.S.
President J. R. Jayewardene and Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi after signing the Indo-Lanka Accord, which paved the way for the provincial council system.
“Upon the making of a proclamation under the Public Security Ordinance or the law for the time being in force relating to public security, bringing the provisions of such Ordinance or law into operation on the ground that the maintenance of essential supplies and services is, threatened or that the security of Sri Lanka is threatened by war or external aggression or armed rebellion, the President may give directions to any Governor as to the manner in which the executive power exercisable by the Governor is to be exercised …”
(The previous article titled ‘The totally inadequate Sixth Amendment’ was published in The Island on Friday the 12th July)
If one continues the study of the amendments to the 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka, the 7th Amendment was brought to make provision for increasing the number of administrative and electoral districts. The 8th Amendment was about the appointment of President’s Counsel. The 9th Amendment was to adjust the salary scales of public servants who are not qualified to be elected as Members of Parliament. The 10th Amendment was brought to remove the requirement of a two-thirds majority in Parliament to maintain a state of emergency beyond a stipulated period. The 11th Amendment was about the jurisdiction of the High Court and the authority of the Judicial Services Commission and the number of judges who shall constitute a bench etc. The 12th Amendment was not enacted. Thus we see that Amendments 7 to 12 were largely on housekeeping matters.
It is noteworthy that when the 1978 Constitution was first enacted, under the original Article 155, if a state of emergency had been in operation for a period of ninety consecutive days or a period of ninety days in total during six consecutive months, no declaration of a state of emergency made during the ensuing six months could be maintained for more than ten days unless such Proclamation was approved by Parliament by a two-thirds majority of the whole number of Members of Parliament. It should be noted that this was not just two thirds of the number of MPs who may be present on that day in Parliament, but two thirds of the whole number of MPs in Parliament – a requirement which substantially ups the ante.
In the context of the late 1970s, this provision may have been a knee-jerk reaction to the emergency rule that took place under the Sirima Bandaranaike government. However as the northern terrorist threat grew, wiser counsel prevailed and the Constitution was amended accordingly. Of all the housekeeping Constitutional Amendments, the most useful and important one was arguably the Tenth Amendment, which removed the requirement for a two thirds majority of the whole number of MPs in Parliament to maintain a state of emergency beyond a certain period.
Look-alikes that are not alike
The Thirteenth Amendment was not something that grew out of our soil but was imposed on Sri Lanka by India, which thought it was a suitable compromise solution to the demand for a separate state. The Indian central government at that time saw itself as the champion of Tamil rights in Sri Lanka. So it imposed on Sri Lanka what was supposed to be a replica of the system of devolution that was in practice in India in a ‘one size fits all’ kind of solution. The J. R. Jayewardene government was forced to accept what the Indians imposed on Sri Lanka under threat of a fully-fledged invasion of this country. In the late 1980s, the situation was such that the Indians would have followed through with such a threat. They had at that time not yet tasted the bitter fruit that was to result from this intervention. Hence this particular Constitutional Amendment is the one exception where the folly cannot be blamed on a Sri Lankan government or Sri Lankan political parties. The system of devolution that was imposed on Sri Lanka by the Indians superficially looks like the system in operation in India.
Each Province in Sri Lanka like the States in India, has an elected legislative body which can make statutes applicable within that province in relation to the subjects coming under the purview of the provinces. The powers of the elected provincial councils are, more or less, the same as the powers devolved on the Indian states. The three lists of powers which stipulate the powers of the central government, the powers devolved to the provinces and the concurrent powers that can be wielded by both the center and the provinces are modeled on the three lists in the Indian Constitution. The powers of the provincial governors are the same as those of the state governors in India. As in the Indian states, each province was to have a separate police force with the same powers as the Indian state police forces. The powers over land devolved to the provinces in Sri Lanka and India are, more or less, the same.
There is even a provision in the 13th Amendment incorporated into the Constitution as Article 154L for ‘President’s rule’ like in India. Even the wording of this provision in the 13th Amendment is very similar to Article 356 of the Indian Constitution. If the President, on receipt of a report from the Governor of the Province or otherwise, is satisfied that a situation has arisen in which the administration of the Province cannot be carried on in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution, the President may by Proclamation- (a) assume to himself all or any of the functions of the administration of the Province and all or any of the powers vested in, or exercisable by, the Governor. (b) declare that the powers of the Provincial Council shall be exercisable by, or under the authority of, Parliament.
Article 353 of the Indian Constitution has a provision which states that while a Proclamation of Emergency is in operation, the executive power of the Union shall extend to the giving of directions to any State as to the manner in which the executive power thereof is to be exercised. A similar provision can be seen in the Thirteenth Amendment which has been incorporated into the Sri Lankan
Constitution as Article 154J which goes as follows: “Upon the making of a proclamation under the Public Security Ordinance or the law for the time being in force relating to public security, bringing the provisions of such Ordinance or law into operation on the ground that the maintenance of essential supplies and services is, threatened or that the security of Sri Lanka is threatened by war or external aggression or armed rebellion, the President may give directions to any Governor as to the manner in which the executive power exercisable by the Governor is to be exercised …”
Despite the superficial similarity of the systems of devolution in practice in Sri Lanka and India, Sri Lanka has been deprived of all the most important safeguards that the central government in India has vis-a-vis the states. The shortchanging starts with the safeguard that has grudgingly been given to the Sri Lankan center vis-a-vis the provinces. In Sri Lanka, President’s rule can last only for a maximum of one year whereas in India, President’s rule can last for up to three years. The important safeguards that are available to the Indian centre but unavailable to the Sri Lankan center are as follows:
Safeguards available to the Indian Centre
Article 201 of the Indian Constitution: When a Bill has been passed by a state legislature, it is presented to the Governor. The Governor can either assent to the Bill or reserve it for the consideration of the President. When a Bill is reserved by a Governor for the consideration of the President, the President can either assent to the Bill or withhold assent. The President may direct the Governor to return the Bill to the relevant state legislature with his observations and the state legislature can reconsider it within a period of six months. If it is once again passed by the state legislature with or without amendment, it shall be presented again to the President for his consideration. There is nothing in the Indian Constitution to say that the President is mandatorily required to assent to a Bill from a state legislature even when it is sent to him after being passed for a second time. All that a State can do through its Governor is to present a Bill to the President for his ‘consideration’. Assenting to it or not will be entirely at the discretion of the President. Article 201 gives the Indian President the power to effectively veto Bills of state legislatures.
Some Indian states are much bigger than most nation states in the world and many are far bigger than Sri Lanka both in terms of population and land mass. Yet the Indian President has the power to veto Bills coming from such large sub-national entities. In Sri Lanka however, when a Provincial Governor reserves a statute for reference to the President, all that the Sri Lankan President is empowered to do is to refer it to the Supreme Court for a determination that it is not inconsistent with the provisions of the Constitution. If the Supreme Court determines that the statute is consistent with the provisions of the Constitution, the Governor on receipt of the Court’s determination is mandatorily required to assent to the statute. Thus, we see that when it comes to assenting or not assenting to provincial statutes, the Sri Lankan President is, at best, only a post box.
Article 249 of the Indian Constitution: If the Indian upper house of Parliament the Rajya Sabha has declared by resolution supported by not less than two-thirds of the members present and voting that it is necessary or expedient in the national interest that Parliament should make laws with respect to any matter enumerated in the State List specified in the resolution, it shall be lawful for Parliament to make laws for the whole or any part of the territory of India with respect to that matter while the resolution remains in force. Such a resolution shall remain in force for a period not exceeding one year. It can continue to be in force for as many years as is necessary provided the Rajya Sabha keeps renewing the resolution annually. It should be noted that this resolution needs to be passed only in the upper house and not in the Lok Sabha. The 245 member Rajya Sabha is made up of representatives of the Indian states with the number of representatives depending on the size and population of the state.
It should be noted that the majority required to pass such a resolution is only two thirds of the Members present on that day and not two thirds of the whole number of Members of the Rajya sabha. This provision gives the representatives of other states of the Indian union sweeping powers to resolutely intervene to bring a separatist state under control. The Rajya Sabha has the power to apply this provision to a part of India or even the entire country if necessary and there is no limit to the number of years it can be in operation provided the resolution is renewed annually. Article 250 of the Indian Constitution: Parliament has the power to legislate with respect to any matter in the State List whenever a state of emergency is in operation. This power may extend to the whole of India or to just one state according to requirement. Article 251 of the Indian Constitution stipulates that whenever the Indian Parliament makes laws relating to subjects coming under the states in terms of Articles 249 and 250, the law made by Parliament so long as it is in force, will override any law on the same matter made by the state legislatures. In Sri Lanka, if Parliament is to legislate on a matter coming under the purview of the PCs without the consent of each and every provincial council, it will have to be passed by a two-thirds majority in Parliament. In Sri Lanka this requirement does not change even when an emergency is in operation.
Article 354 of the Indian Constitution: When a state of emergency is in operation, the Indian President has complete power over the powers of taxation of the Indian states. Thus. he can suspend or modify the powers of taxation given to the states by Articles 268 to 279 of the Indian Constitution. Such a provision gives the central authorities a very strong hold over the states. The Sri Lankan President has no such powers under the 13th Amendment.
There is no gainsaying the fact that Articles 201, 249, 250, 251 and 354 of the Indian Constitution make a world of a difference. If the Sri Lankan President was able to veto any statute passed by the Provincial Councils, if all the Provincial Council Members in Sri Lanka sitting as a formal body (in lieu of a Rajya Sabha) was able to with a two-thirds majority authorise the Parliament to take over all the functions of a provincial council in the national interest and continue for an indefinite period, if the declaration of a state of emergency automatically vested Parliament with the power to make laws with regard to any subject coming under the provincial councils by a simple majority, and the powers of taxation of the provincial councils can be automatically taken over by the center whenever a state of emergency is in operation, the whole game would be different. The attitude of the people towards the devolution of power itself would be different.
What we have now is a situation where Sri Lanka is expected to implement the devolution part of the Indian system including having separate police forces for each province, but without any of the above mentioned safeguards. During the last years of the Congress Party government, the full implementation of the 13th Amendment was a constant demand made on Sri Lanka. That demand should have been accompanied by an invitation to adopt Articles 201, 249, 250, 251 and 354 of the Indian Constitution as well. If a country like India needs such safeguards, how is anybody to argue that Sri Lanka can do without them? The above mentioned Articles of the Indian Constitution are just key examples of what is lacking in Sri Lanka’s 13th Amendment. There is much more. In the previous article, we have pointed out how lacking the Sri Lankan Sixth Amendment is when compared to the Indian 16th Amendment. All these things finally add up to a massive Constitutional failure in SL.
Playing ducks and drakes with electoral system
August 8, 2019, 12:00 pm
By C.A.Chandraprema
(The previous article in this series of self-contained pieces on the Constitution was published on Monday the 22nd July.)
The electoral system as regards Parliament originally laid out in the 1978 Constitution was very different to what we have today. Before the Fourteenth Amendment, there were to be only 196 MPs and not 225. There was no National List. There was no preferential vote system. Some features of the elections system were the same as what we have today. Each Province was to have four seats distributed among the electoral districts in that Province. The total number of seats to be allocated in this manner was 36 (4 X 9 Provinces). Each province got four seats irrespective of its population, land mass, and number of electoral districts.
Then, as now, 160 seats were to be apportioned among the various electoral districts in accordance with the number of registered voters in each of them. The total number of voters registered in the Electoral Register of the country was divided by 160 to arrive at the ‘qualifying number’. The total number of voters registered in each of the electoral districts was then divided by this qualifying number to arrive at the number of MPs that each electoral district was entitled to return. Any leftover seats would be allocated to the districts with the highest number of residual votes. (It should be noted that seats are not allocated to the districts on the basis of their population but on the number of registered voters.)
The original Parliamentary elections system in the1978 Constitution did not have a preferential vote system. Each political party or independent group was to submit one nomination paper for each electoral district setting out the names in the order of priority that the candidates should be elected. The number of nominees on each nomination paper would be equal to the number of Members to be elected for that electoral district, increased by one-third. The party or group that gets the highest number of votes in that electoral district was to have the candidate whose name appears first in the nomination paper declared elected.
Thereafter, the parties or independent groups that polled less than one-eighth (12.5%) of the total votes polled in that electoral district were to be taken out of the race. The votes polled by these disqualified parties and independent groups, would then be deducted from the total votes polled in that electoral district to arrive at the ‘relevant number of votes’. The ‘relevant number of votes’ was then to be divided by the number of members to be elected for that electoral district reduced by one. (The reduction of one seat being the one that was allocated to the party that got the highest number of votes.) The number resulting from the division of the ‘relevant number of votes’ by the number of members to be elected for that electoral district reduced by one, is the ‘resulting number’.
The number of votes polled by each party and independent group that got more than 12.5% of the votes in that district beginning with the party or group which polled the highest number of votes, is then divided by the resulting number to arrive at the number of MPs each such party or group was entitled to in that district.
Under the original system laid down in the 1978 Constitution, political parties were to have the right to change the order of priority of the names in the nomination paper even after they had been declared elected and to substitute the names of other persons in place of those who have died or ceased to be members of such party. Thus, this was a system that gave the political party complete power over its MPs. This system was never implemented.
The 14th & 15th Amendments
The Fourteenth Amendment, which was introduced, in May 1988, before any Parliamentary election was ever held under the 1978 Constitution, introduced the preferential vote system whereby voters were entitled to indicate up to three preferences for candidates of the party they voted for. Thus, it was not the political party hierarchy that would decide who would get a seat in Parliament but the voters themselves. This was undoubtedly a more democratic way of doing things, but the preferential vote system gave rise to a number of other problems such as candidates having to canvass for preferential votes across an entire district, some constituencies ending up without an identifiable representative in Parliament, big spenders unsuited to hold public office being able to skim preferential votes off the entire district to get into Parliament, and the institutionalization of corruption due to the heavy expenditure involved in getting elected.
The Fourteenth Amendment also increased the number of MPs in Parliament from 196 to 225 by the addition of the National List of 29 seats, which were to be apportioned among the parties contesting the election on the basis of the proportion of votes they polled nationwide.
Perhaps, in recognition of the difficulties involved in obtaining preferential votes from all over an electoral district, the 14th Amendment, provided for electoral districts entitled to return more than 10 members to be divided into two zones and those entitled to return more than 20 MPs to be divided into 3 zones. Since there are no districts entitled to return more than 20 MPs, two zones would have been the maximum per district. Many districts would not have had zones at all because they were not entitled to return more than ten MPs. Each zone was to be a combination of two or more of polling divisions (constituencies/electorates). The number of MPs each zone was entitled to return was to be determined on the same basis as apportioning seats to each electoral district as outlined earlier.
In December 1988, the Fifteenth Amendment changed the system of elections yet again and the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to divide some districts into zones, was abolished. The most far reaching and damaging change in the elections system introduced by the Fifteenth Amendment was the reduction of the district cut off point from 12.5% to 5%.
This enabled many small ethnicity and religion-based political parties to proliferate and has undermined the ability of the national political parties to form stable governments. The reduction of the cut-off point was not a well thought out matter of policy but a part of the political horse trading that went on before the 1988 December Presidential elections.
The Fifteenth Amendment was signed into law just 48 hours before the Presidential election of 19 December 1988 so that President Premadasa could obtain the votes of the then newly formed Sri Lanka Muslim Congress.
In the 30 years that has passed since this system of elections came into operation in 1989, it has given the party that wins the Parliamentary election a clear majority only on two occasions in 1989 and 2010. There have been calls for electoral reform including the reintroduction of a constituency based system so that each constituency will have an identifiable representative in Parliament and for the abolishing of the preference vote system. The need to canvass throughout a district in order to get elected has also come in for much criticism as this has increased the costs associated with an election campaign and the costs associated with maintaining the MP’s presence among the constituents and given rise to endemic corruption.
The best thought out proposal for reform of this electoral system was put forward by the Parliamentary Select Committee on Electoral Reform headed by Dinesh Gunawardene in 2007 after several years of deliberations. This PSC was first set up under the UNP government in 2002. According to the proposal put forward by the Dinesh Gunawardene Committee, Parliament was to have a total 225 MPs as at present. Of this, 140 MPs were to be elected directly from constituencies on the first past the post system. Another 70 MPs were to be elected on the district proportional representation system as follows: Firstly, the votes polled by the winning candidates in the constituencies within the district will be eliminated. Then the votes polled by the ‘other candidates’ of all the electorates within the district were to be totaled and divided by the number of proportional representation seats allocated for that district to arrive at the ‘qualifying number’. The number of votes received by each party for that district through the ‘other candidates’ would be divided by the ‘qualifying number’ to arrive at the number of seats that party was entitled to on the proportional representation quota. The candidate to be elected to Parliament under the district proportional representation system would be the ‘other candidate’ who has received the highest percentage of votes from his electorate (the best losers among those who contested the constituencies).
*Dinesh Gunawardene PSC recommendations
* The 15 National List seats were to be allocated as follows: Five seats would go to the party securing the highest number of valid votes at the election as bonus seats. Out of the balance, three seats were to be reserved for unrepresented minor parties that polled more than 5% nationwide but have not qualified for a seat. If there are no such parties, these three seats will be allocated in the same manner as other national list seats on the basis of the number of votes polled by each party at the national level. This is the best proposal for electoral reform that we have on the table at present. The only drawback is that this system requires a new demarcation of constituencies/ electorates to reduce the present number of 160 constituencies to 140.
Dr. Sudantha Liyanage, who designed the system that was modified and adopted by the Dinesh Gunawardene PSC, is skeptical that the delimitation process would be able to go off without a hitch, because some districts would have to bear the brunt of the reduction in the number of seats. Even though there is around one year till the next Parliamentary election, nobody is recommending electoral reform at the Parliamentary level at this stage due to the fear that the delimitation process may not be completed in time. The only real chance for the implementation of this system is if the political parties manage to come to an agreement on the delimitation of constituencies before the Bill to amend the section on Parliamentary elections in the Constitution is introduced. Not that this is impossible. An agreement between the two main political parties will suffice for that purpose. The two main political parties did cooperate with one another when the Dinesh Gunawardene Committee recommendations were passed into law for the local government level in November 2012.
The system that was put into place in 2012 for the local government institutions was never implemented. In 2017, it was changed again by the present government, introducing a pure proportional representation system which is now reviled by everybody including the political parties that promoted it. The 2018 local government election was held under this new system leaving everyone disgruntled. The UNP government of the late 1980s played ducks and drakes with the system of elections and, today, we have another UNP government doing the same thing. The next government will have to take up electoral reform as a matter of priority. Nobody wants the long delayed provincial council elections held under the elections system introduced in 2017.
Electoral system: No option but patchwork solutions?
August 9, 2019, 8:59 pm
By C. A. Chandraprema
(Continued from yesterday)
Due to the difficulties anticipated in the delimitation process if the Dinesh Gunewardene PSC recommendations are to be implemented, some including Dr. Sudantha Liyanage, who designed that system, have given thought to an alternative proposal which will retain the present proportional representation system but still provide the party that wins a parliamentary election a working majority. This is based on the logic that if we can’t have proper electoral reform we must at least ensure that stable governments will be formed until a proper electoral reform process takes place. Most importantly, the alternative proposal would not require a fresh delimitation. One such proposal is to take about 12 seats out of the National List and to give them to the winning party as bonus seats. (As we saw in yesterday’s article, the system proposed by the Dinesh Gunawardene Committee also had five bonus seats from the National List allocated to the winning party).
At the parliamentary elections of 1994, 2000, 2001, 2004 and 2015 the winning parties got 105, 107, 109, 105 and 106 seats respectively inclusive of the national list seats. So it was a case of being short of anything between 4 to 8 seats to have the 113 seats that will provide a working majority. At the elections mentioned above, the number of national list seats that the winning party was entitled to was 14, 13, 13, 13, and 13 respectively. Even if 12 seats are taken out of the national list and given to the winning party as bonus seats, that number would include about 6 to 7 seats that the winning party was entitled to anyway and the number of seats the winning party finally gets as actual bonus seats, could be as low as five or six. This could lead to a situation where even after getting the 12 bonus seats, the winning party may still not get a working majority of 113 seats – a frightening thought.
Abolish the national list
In this context, there is perhaps a solution of sorts, which this writer would like to suggest. As pointed out earlier, the national list was only an afterthought which came with the Fourteenth Amendment. Originally, there were supposed to be only 196 MPs in Parliament, and no national list. My suggestion is that the national list be abolished altogether leaving only 12 bonus seats for the winning party after the fashion of the 1948 Constitution, which had provision for the appointment of six MPs by the party that forms a government after an election. That would reduce the number of MPs in Parliament from the present 225 to 208 (196 elected MPs + 12 appointed MPs). A reduction in the number of MPs will always be welcomed by the general public.
In today’s context, it is important to specify that the 12 bonus seats will be given to the party that wins the most number of seats at the election, and not to the party that manages through various horse deals to cobble together a government after an election. The 1948 Constitution assumed that it would be the party that wins the most number of seats that would form a government. That assumption will not work with today’s conspiratorial and interest group driven politics and it is absolutely essential to specify that it is only the party that wins the most number of seats that will get the 12 bonus seats.
The 1948 Constitution, with only 101 MPs in Parliament, gave the party that forms a government six bonus seats. So to have 12 bonus seats in a Parliament of 208, is not excessive at all. If the number of MPs is reduced to 208, the number of MPs necessary to form a stable government will be 105. An examination of the election results of the past 30 years will show that after 196 MPs are elected from the districts, an additional 12 bonus seats would enable the winning party to have a working majority. It is, of course, impossible to totally eliminate the possibility of the winning party falling just short of a working majority. The idea would be to ensure that hung Parliaments are the exception rather than the norm. As things stand today, winning parties without a working majority is the norm. The two exceptions to that in the past 30 years being the Parliaments of 1989 and 2010.
The National List has earned a bad name and abolishing it will be welcomed by the public and even by elected MPs. One difficulty in abolishing it is that over the years, every political party has got accustomed to nominating a few critically important people to Parliament through it. In the case of the winning party, this will be no issue because there will be the 12 bonus seats to which they can be appointed. However, the parties in the Opposition will have no way of appointing people they believe to be of importance to the party, to Parliament. Perhaps, the way to deal with this may be to take a leaf from the original 1978 Constitution and give the political parties unfettered authority to appoint whoever they like to one or two seats won by that party in each province.
Each province is allocated four seats in Parliament. When these seats are apportioned to the various electoral districts in the province, they become the district bonus seats that everyone is familiar with. Even though the popular belief is that each district has only one bonus seat, some districts have two bonus seats. If a Province has three electoral districts, two electoral districts will get one bonus seat each and the remaining district will get two bonus seats. To illustrate this by way of an example, the Colombo district is entitled to17 seats going by the number of registered voters in the district. With the bonus seat, the Colombo district should have 18 seats. But it actually has 19 seats because it has got the left over seat in the Western Province.
One seat for the political party
Going by its number of registered voters, the Gampaha district should have 17 seats. With the bonus seat that it is entitled to, the Gampha district has got 18 seats and no extra seats. In the Central Province, after Matale and Kandy have been allocated one bonus seat each, the Nuwara Eliya district has got the extra seat. Likewise, the Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa electoral districts in the North Central Province have two bonus seats each because the NCP has only two electoral districts. If each electoral district was to have only one bonus seat, there would be only 22 bonus seats for the 22 electoral districts in the country. But in reality there are 36 bonus seats. Though many people in the Colombo district may believe that they have only one bonus seat, they have two, and this extra seat passes off even among politicians as a seat that the Colombo district is entitled to on the basis of its number of registered voters under Article 98 of the Constitution.
The Colombo district is entitled to only 17 seats under Article 98 but they have 19 with the two bonus seats. Countrywide, these extra seats add up to 14 of the 36 seats allocated to the provinces. If one goes by the principle that each district should have only one bonus seat, we see that some Provinces have one or even two seats over and above the bonus seat and the seats that the electoral districts in that Province would be entitled to on the basis of the number of registered voters. The Western Province will have one such special seat, the Central Province one, the North Central Province two and so on. If the political parties contesting in those provinces are allowed to fill one or two seats they win as the party deems fit, that may meet the need of political parties to accommodate politically important individuals in Parliament.
Of course such dignitaries may have to make themselves useful in the election campaign in the relevant province and especially in the district which has this extra seat so as to pacify those at the ground level and to justify his appointment to Parliament. It may of course be a bit difficult at first to convince the ground level politicians that some districts have one extra seat. If J.R.Jayewardene’s original plan was to give the political party complete authority over appointing MPs to Parliament after an election, surely there is nothing wrong in allowing political parties to appoint just one MP at their discretion and that too only in the districts that have this extra seat?
Appointing constituency organisers as MPs
If we are constrained to apply a patch work solution to the problem of not being able to implement the Dinesh Gunawardene Committee recommendations due to anticipated delimitation issues, then we will have to seek a patchwork solution to the issue of having constituency based representation as well. One solution could be to take the responsibility for appointing representatives for the constituencies out of the ambit of the Constitution and hand it over to the political parties.
All political parties still appoint their electoral organisers on the basis of the existing 160 electorates or constituencies. The appointment of an electoral organizer by a political party could become a more formal affair where the letter appointing a person as an electoral organizer is accorded some legal validity while political parties retain the entitlement to change their organisers at any time as they deem fit. When an election comes along, these organisers become the candidates with their names appearing on the party nominations list. If the preference vote is done away with, candidates can be declared elected to Parliament by their party on the basis of the percentage of votes that each electoral organizer/candidate obtains within his constituency to bolster the overall performance of his party in that district.
This will eliminate the need for the preference voting system and the need for candidates to canvas for votes throughout an entire district with all the concomitant problems of such a system. Since the number of MPs that a political party will get in a district will be decided on the basis of the proportion of votes it polls, and not on the number of constituencies it wins, every electoral organizer will have to be given constituencies of a regular size with a specified minimum number of registered votes so as to give him a fair chance to obtain a proportion of votes that would get him a seat in Parliament. This way, the responsibility of bringing down the size of the electoral unit from a district to a single constituency or a combination of small constituencies will be shifted from the Constitution to the political parties.
Under such a system, it could well be that a candidate who has won the constituency allocated to him by his party may not be elected an MP if his party’s allocation of seats according to the proportion of votes won in the district runs out before it comes to his turn. He would then be the next on the list to be appointed to Parliament on the death or resignation or expulsion of an MP elected on his list. This kind of thing happens even now. All political parties have electoral organisers who regularly win the electorates they have been assigned by their party but who never get into Parliament because they have not been able to obtain the required number of preference votes. In any event, electoral reform is an urgent need in this country and even a patchwork solution will be better than nothing.
UPFA MP Nimal Lanza, of all people, on Thursday, complained to Speaker Karu Jayasuriya that MP Dr. Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe had called Parliament the most corrupt institution in the country. The Speaker’s position was that Wijeyadasa should leave Parliament if the latter had so low an opinion of it.
Dr. Rajapakshe, being a senior lawyer, may not have said so without evidence to support his claim. If only the Speaker had asked Wijeyadasa to substantiate that allegation. No less a person than President Maithripala Sirisena has said that it costs about Rs. 500 mn to engineer a single crossover in Parliament. One wonders whether that was the amount paid to those who defected to the 52-day government, forcibly formed by Sirisena and Mahinda Rajapaksa. There have been many crossovers in Parliament during the last three decades or so and, going by the President’s claim, billions of rupees must have changed hands. Will anyone ask the President not to attend Parliament over that statement?
Dr. Rajapakshe has drawn heavy flak from some of his parliamentary colleagues for criticising Parliament for having received free computers from a foreign government. It is popularly said in this country that one should not reject even a headache given free of charge. But there are situations where gift horses have to be looked not only in the mouth but also in the belly if trouble is to be averted. One may recall that the installation of free Chinese computers in Parliament coincided with a debate on the leasing of the Hambantota Port to China! It is said that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
Can’t Parliament afford new computers? Is the country so broke? If so, how come, according to the JVP, two cars, costing Rs. 300 million each, were once ordered for the Prime Minister? President Sirisena has reportedly shot down a Cabinet paper seeking approval for importing a highly expensive car for the Opposition Leader. He also scuttled a recent government move to grant a 200,000-rupee pay hike to MPs. The Agriculture Ministry paid a huge rent for a building for several years without occupying it. The Presidential Commission of Inquiry, probing corruption in the present administration, was informed, the other day, that the Education Ministry had sought to pay about Rs. 2 billion in excess of the budgeted amount for table computers to be distributed among the GCE A/L students and their teachers in some schools. If the government cares to curtail the criminal waste of state resources, it may be able to give a free tab computer to each and every Sri Lankan.
The national legislature should not be like a pavement near the Colombo Town Hall, where panhandlers seek alms. It should be able to manage its finances frugally without undertaking projects it cannot afford. We often hear MPs complain to the Speaker about what they call affronts to the dignity of Parliament. Accepting pin (free) computers, etc., from other countries is not the way to preserve the dignity of the House. Wijeyadasa says he has got the pin computer removed from his table; he deserves praise and not barbs for doing so.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was quoted by this newspaper, last Saturday, as having said that the people were disgusted with all 225 MPs. His detractors say he does not feel the pulse of the people. He has proved them wrong for once! The PM is lucky that he is too big to be taken to task in Parliament over his statement, which, in our book, is commendable and has struck a responsive chord with the public.
Those who are critical of corruption in the institutions they belong to must not be asked to leave or smoked out lest those places should lose the few good people they are left with and end up being havens for the corrupt. Heads of those institutions had not better tell their critics to conform or depart.
The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), on Thursday (8), assured that it wouldn’t, under any circumstances, enter into electoral pacts with political parties or groups blamed for the Easter Sunday attacks or responsible for promoting extremism.
SLPP strategist Basil Rajapaksa gave that assurance in response to media queries at a special press conference called by the party at Kingsbury to announce the party convention on Aug 11 at the Sugathadasa Indoor Stadium.
Flanked by SLPP Chairman Prof. G.L. Peiris and its Secretary, attorney-at-law Sagara Kariyawasam, Rajapaksa explained how a section of the media had inadvertently described a Muslim organization affiliated to the UPFA/SLPP at the 2010 and 2015 polls as the one allegedly involved in extremist activities.
Asked whether the SLPP would seek an alliance with M. L. A. M. Hizbullah,who had represented more than one political party in parliament, Rajapaksa said that the Batticaloa District-based politician represented the SLFP. He, however, pointed out the role played by Hizbullah in the last SLFP Local Government election campaign at Kattankudy and Eravur.
Rajapaksa reconfirmed that his brother, Gotabaya, had renounced his US citizenship though he Basil had retained it.
In terms of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, enacted in 2015, dual citizens cannot contest either presidential or parliamentary elections. Gotabaya in April this year gave up his US citizenship to contest the presidential poll on the SLPP ticket.
Asked whether the SLPP could win the 2019 contest without the SLFP’s support, a smiling Basil Rajapaksa pointed out that the UPFA had lost the last parliamentary election though there was no division at that time. He pointed out how the UPFA had suffered the loss of one million votes in August 2015 after Mahinda Rajapaksa had polled 5.8 mn votes at the presidential election. The bottom line was that though a victory seemed assured in case the SLPP and the SLFP teamed up, the actual situation could be different, Rajapaksa said.
Commenting on the JVP declaration that it would field a candidate on its own for the 2019 presidential poll, Rajapaksa pointed out that there were occasions when the JVP changed its decision at the last moment.
Rajapaksa said that anything could happen before the election.
Asked whether the SLPP was ready to receive former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s backing, Rajapaksa said there wouldn’t be any issue.
MANILA – At least two terrorists from Sri Lanka have sneaked into the Philippines to train local militants on making bombs and attacking churches and other soft targets north of the country.
A watch list from the Manila International Airport Authority identified the two as Mark Kevin Samhoon and Victoria Sophia Sto Domingo. Both were tagged as “suicide bombers”, with kin in the Philippines.
Samhoon has ties to the National Thowheed Jamath (NTJ), the terrorist group accused of carrying out the Easter Sunday attacks in Sri Lanka in April this year that killed at least 250 people, according to the watch list. His mother is a Filipino working as a maid in Dubai.
Samhoon is said to be “connected” to Sto Domingo, though it is unclear what is the link between them.
Sto. Domingo is described as a “black-belter” who had trained children and women in bomb-making. She holds a Philippine and a Sri Lanka passport.
She arrived in the Philippines in November 2018. Samhoon followed her, possibly in June this year.
Mr Rommel Banlaoi, head of the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research, told The Straits Times that Sto Domingo was involved in plotting the suicide attack in January this year on a Roman Catholic cathedral in Sulu province, that killed 23 people and wounded at least 100. Indonesian police tagged Indonesians Rullie Rian Zeke and Ulfah Handayani as the bombers.
BenarNews reported that Samhoon and Sto Domingo were already with a faction of Filipino militants in the main Philippine island of Luzon, some 1,000km north of where most extremist groups linked to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) normally operate.
A group called Suyuful Khilafa Fi Luzon, formed by remnants of the Rajah Sulaiman Islamic Movement, is purportedly planning to bomb churches in Luzon, with help from Samhoon and Sto Domingo.
The capital Manila and other densely populated cities are in Luzon.
Militants are seeking to bomb targets in Luzon to send a message that their influence is spreading in places far from their strongholds, security officials said.
President Rodrigo Duterte’s spokesman Salvador Panelo on Tuesday (Aug 6) confirmed that security forces in Luzon were on heightened alert to thwart such attacks.
According to Mr Banlaoi, a third Sri Lankan, Anarkalie Dulara Palliyaguruge, was also involved in these plots. “Anarkalie is the financier,” he said.
The Sri Lankan has so far been unable to sneak into the Philippines.
Besides the Sri Lankans, an Egyptian couple, both veterans of the fighting in Syria and Afghanistan, were also reported to be in the Philippines to train a younger crop of militants on suicide bombing.
Some 200 Indonesians had also made their way to jungle camps of ISIS-linked groups in war-torn Mindanao island.
“There are dangers ahead. I share the apprehensions of President Duterte,” said Mr Banlaoi.
The President on Monday (Aug 5) voiced concerns over possible ISIS-inspired attacks in Luzon.
“I have ISIS, and this is what I am most afraid of,” he said in a speech. “I am praying, really praying, kneeling before God, to spare us the kind of brutality and cruelty (ISIS brings) because it will really be bloody, bloody as it can be.”
Mr Duterte said he was looking at recruiting thousands more to augment the military’s special forces units.
“We are facing so many fronts. I need more soldiers,” he added.
Sri Lankans born after 1948 must be the most unfortunate folk living on this planet, despite many narrations indicating, according to Buddhist belief that, Sri Lanka is a blessed country and several Gods have sanctified this nation”. Could it be the reason why this Island was once known as the Dharma Deepa?
When the Portuguese arrived in Ceylon in 1505, they introduced beef eating to the natives which then became a common habit, even among Buddhists, mostly influenced by Christians and later backed by the Colonial rulers. Anagarika Dharmapala, as a defender of the Buddhist faith, cautioned people by going from place to place and displaying a prominent banner, Gavamas nokan (don’t eat beef), when consumption of beef had become a habit, because a pound of beef at that time was thirty cents.
(Aryadasa) Ratnasinghe- 2001 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd).
Harmony
During the colonial regime (prior to 1948), there were campaigns calling upon the public not to eat beef. It is often said that our forefathers lived in complete harmony and being kind to each other. During foreign reign and even during Colonial rule what was remarkable, as we read in history books today, is how even Indian kings who ruled this nation and later the British rulers respected Sinhala culture and showed reverence to Buddhism. The British specifically had refrained from consuming beef at public ceremonies as a mark of respect to Buddhism as well as to the pious people of the land. It was a time when the late Singaporean Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, after visiting Ceylon, commented how he wished to emulate the Ceylon module to Transform Singapore into self-sufficient standards, akin to Ceylon!”
Complete
But today, can we say the same? Perhaps it would be complete harmony to quote what he later uttered: There were two options for me, either I got corrupted and place my family in the Forbes List of the richest people in the world, or leave my people (for which I was elected the Prime Minister) among the countries listed in the list of the best ten economies in the world! I hasten to say that I chose the second option.”
If the same questions were to be posed to our current crop of politicians in Sri Lanka, probably they would come with: ‘There were two options for us too, but the second option was already taken by the Singapore Prime Minister, so we had no other alternative but to seek the first option!” Lee Kuan Yew was Singapore’s first Prime Minister and architect of the tiny city that he converted into a global trade and financial centre.
This obviously summarises the citation that, Sri Lankans must be the most unfortunate folk living on this planet”, because from the time the British left good old Ceylon, after handing over the responsibilities of running the country’s affairs to locals, Lord Solebury, who headed the Soulbery Commission, had this to say: Sri ‘Lankans are not ready to govern their country.”
Sri Lanka was known as Dharma Deepa once, but it has turned 360 Degrees today to be explicitly called as ‘Adarma Deepa’ (a perfidious nation), because of rampant corruption that takes place from top to bottom in society.
Politics has transformed into a modern industry and parliamentarians and administrators equally, who are being elected and selected to serve the nation, have become corrupt and corrugated to the level of stinking to high heaven. After achieving independence from the British, a few of Sri Lanka’s elite, who appeared in tail coats and top hats, began to emulate the British, rather than adopting a suitable policy that suited the local culture that any future Government could work on the basis of a structured policy.
Divide and Rule concept
By imitating and adapting British policies and behaviour, the new batch of politicians in Ceylon, automatically became accustomed to the British style of ‘divide and rule’ that gave rise to the formation of different political parties, under diverse hues, marking a division in society. Naive persons began to split into such groups, for their personal gains, akin to chewing gum adherence, with emotional affirmations such as ‘Kapuwath Api’ UNP, SLFP or Communist and LSSP supporters!
This trend transformed into a contagious state when the head of the family supported any particular Party, the rest of the family too blindly followed suit. Society automatically became segregated due to various boons offered to the people such as giving employment opportunities to party members, while ignoring the other members of society; similarly, entrepreneurs contributed to both parties – the ruling as well as the opposition – playing it safe.
Exposure
This trend continued for 71 long years, until the public began to recognise politicians’ nudity in many a form, including politicians of the ruling and ruled parties and how they have allowed the country to go downhill economically, industrially, scholastically, educationally and scientifically, leaving the poor villages and villagers to suffer immensely. What the politicians should have done all these years are now being done by various TV companies as humanitarian campaigns.
Sad situation
It is such a, therefore, the word ‘politics’ today has turned into a ‘play game’ where some of the prominent members of the Government display egocentric tendencies rather than serving the people who have elected them to serve the country. Sri Lanka is on record as the only country where a politician, after ‘hanging on to his parliamentary seat’ for five years, qualifies for a pension for life whereas the hard-working people have to sweat for 30 to 40 years to qualify for such a privilege and at the end of the day they are shocked to find that their EPF money too had been expended on the Government on massive frauds such as the scandalous Central Bank scam!
Despite all the perks by politicians and qualifying themselves for a special allowance to attend parliamentary sessions, most of the time Parliament has had to abandon its sittings due to the absence of a quorum! Even if they were to be present, some Ministers, akin to kindergarten children, are seen coming out with flippant answers to questions raised by members of the Opposition to purposely transform the August assembly into a clowning gallery; some keep on nodding and were seen falling asleep in their comfortable chairs as if they hadn’t had a wink of sleep the night before! What a comedy!
It may be God’s grace that people in this country have awoken to find what a mockery politicians are upto at last and the word ‘politician’ has become the most despicable word spoken, as they have been manipulating the masses with all kinds of bull during election time in order to come to power and once elected are hell bent on seeking luxuries in life such as getting tax free car permits, duty free petrol and all kinds of allowances. Sri Lanka has to be the only country on this planet where an ordinary citizen has to pay millions just to buy a family car! Today this Island, has become a ‘debt-den’ according to political connoisseurs, who state that even our future generations will have to pay millions in the form of taxes! Politicians and rulers have had their heyday for 71 long years, taking the ordinary folks, who they consider to be naïve, stupid and mere idiots, for a ride, but the upcoming elections, which are around the corner, could see the suffering masses give a positive verdict, to send the so-called ‘old age pensioners’ home and bring new blood into Parliament as they offer a fresh start and will serve as patriots.
Inferiority complex
The major drawback for the past 71 years has been the citizenry’s inferiority complex that was carried forward from the Colonial time by calling the very representatives they elect to serve them ‘honourable members’ and worshiping them by bending into two when approaching them as if they are descended Gods, but what people forget is the fact that MPs have been appointed by the people to serve people and they are ‘technically servants’ of the people.
The mentality of Sri Lankans was (and still is) that they seem to consider themselves inferior due to their mediocracy, because unlike any other developed country Sri Lankan mentality has been to look down upon the job one does for a living, due to the division of labour introduced by the Chinese from time immemorial. So, they automatically seem to think they are ‘inferior,’ without understanding the fact that there is no difference in any job one does except the variation of the responsibility one carries! After all, human rights are given a prominent place in the world, and there are international institutions to deal with human rights violations. Therefore, it is high time that every Sri Lankan begins to think in terms of a human being who has an equal right in society and not to be discarded as a mass of human flesh!
Think sensibly
The time has come for every citizen to think sensibly as the elections are around the corner to identify and elect those who are educated, selfless, and compassionate and only those who feel the pulse of the people and not to send businessmen, thugs or rapists to Parliament.
Leader of Opposition Mahinda Rajapaksa has promised that he would not allow any injustice to be inflicted on the parliamentarians of Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).
He stated this during a meeting held with a group of SLFP members today (09).
A group of SLFP local government representatives for Kandy met the Opposition Leader at his official residence.
Meanwhile, another group of SLFP members representing the Batticaloa district also held discussions with the Opposition Leader.
The Supreme Court today (09) dismissed three petitions filed in favour of the Private Member’s Bill submitted in Parliament seeking to abolish the death penalty.
The dismissal order was delivered by a three-judge bench consisting of Supreme Court Justices L.T.B. Dehideniya, Murdu Fernando and Gamini Amarasekara.
The petitions were filed by Prof. C. Gunaratne from Nugegoda and two other parties citing the Attorney General as the respondent.
When the petitions were taken up before the Supreme Court, State Counsel appearing on behalf of the Attorney General told the judge bench that the Parliament has already sought the Attorney General’s advice on the Bill in question.
The State Counsel further stated that the judiciary has no jurisdiction to conduct a hearing on this parliamentary proceeding.
Considering the submissions, the Supreme Court judge bench ordered to dismiss the three petitions.
The petitioners claim that Parliamentarian Bandula Lal Bandarigoda had recently included a proposal for the abolition of the death penalty to the Parliament’s agenda.
They have pointed out that any of the provisions of this proposal do not violate the Constitution.
The petitioners hence request the Supreme Court to deliver an order stating that this proposal can be passed with a simple majority in the Parliament.
UNP Deputy Leader Sajith Premadasa says that the United National Party (UNP) should form an alliance only after naming its Presidential Candidate.
Issuing a statement, the Minister of Housing, Construction and Cultural Affairs stated that certain newspapers had reported today that both he and the Prime Minister had agreed that a UNP-led Democratic National Front (DNF) alliance should be formed as immediately as possible.
Premadasa said that he 100,000%” agrees with the forming of such an alliance.
However, it should be done according to the stance of the majority of the UNP parliamentarians as well as the major parties who have expressed willingness to join the alliance, after naming the Presidential Candidate,” he said.
The minister said that his personal opinion is also the same. He said that doing so would not only help create the proposed alliance, but it would also no doubt lead to numerous other parties and individuals joining together to turn it into a victorious alliance.
Premadasa said what should happen today is not the spreading of false news through the media, but the naming of the presidential candidate and then the designing of an agreement for the new alliance.
The Indian Ocean is one of the most contested regions in the world today. China, the US and India, and also Japan, Saudi Arabia and other rich and powerful states, are struggling for influence over Sri Lanka, which is in the geographic heart of the Indian Ocean. The sea lanes of the Indian Ocean are considered to be the busiest in the world, with more than 80% of global seaborne oil trade estimated to be passing through them.
Sri Lanka is a participant in the Maritime Belt and Silk Road Initiative, China’s extensive network of ports and maritime facilities connecting the Pacific and Indian Oceans. In a controversial move in January 2017, the Sri Lankan government granted China a 99-year lease of Hambantota Port in exchange for US$1.1 billion in debt relief. China is also developing other projects in Sri Lanka, such as the $1.4 billion Port City” in Colombo on land reclaimed from the Indian Ocean.
To curtail Chinese expansion across Asia, the US is turning strategically located Sri Lanka into a military logistics hub” and the center of its Free and Open Indo-Pacific Region Policy.” Moreover, the US-Japan-Australia-India alliance is seeking to involve Sri Lanka in taking on the Chinese challenge.
Control of Sri Lanka has become more urgent for the US since the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled in February that US occupation of the Indian Ocean Chagos Islands is illegal and the islands be handed back to Mauritius as rapidly as possible.” The Diego Garcia military base was established after Britain, which owns” Chagos, forcibly removed its inhabitants between 1968 and 1973. Diego Garcia is one of America’s most important and secretive military bases. It has been central in launching invasions in Iraq and Afghanistan and flying missions across Asia, including over the South China Sea. If the islands go back to Mauritius and the Chagossians who sued for their right to return are allowed back, then the US will require an alternative base. That could be Sri Lanka.
In January 2015, a US-backed Sri Lankan government replaced the former Mahinda Rajapaksa government that defeated the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. Soon thereafter, the new government and the United States co-sponsored a United Nations Human Rights Council Resolution in Geneva. Calling for accountability for alleged war crimes and missing persons in the final stage of the war against the LTTE, the UNHRC Resolution pressured the Sri Lankan government to make significant changes, including the dismissal and imprisonment of its intelligence officers and army personnel. These measures weakened Sri Lankan intelligence and security, paving the way to the Easter Sunday carnage by Islamist terrorists.
The Easter attacks are now being used to justify the acceleration of US intervention in Sri Lanka, which had already been increasing over the last few years. However, the three main bilateral agreements the US has deployed to assert its political, economic and military control over Sri Lanka – MCC, ACSA and SOFA – are facing massive local opposition.
Millennium Challenge Corporation Compact
The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), a foreign-aid agency established by the US Congress, is ready to sign a compact” with Sri Lanka to facilitate private-sector investment and economic growth. Based on a Constraints Analysis” completed by the Center for International Development at Harvard University, the compact identifies three constraints to growth in Sri Lanka: policy uncertainty, poor transportation and logistics, and inadequate access to land, especially the difficulty of the private sector in accessing state land for commercial purposes.”
The MCC Compact would undertake transportation and land management in return for a grant of $480 million to Sri Lanka. The Transport Project will include advanced traffic management, bus transportation modernization and a central ring-road network connecting the Central, Sabaragamuwa and Eastern Provinces to the Western Province. The Land Project would include a state land inventory, deeds registration improvement, land valuation improvement, land grants registration and deed conversion, and land policy and legal governance.
Two new laws, the State Land Bank Bill and a Land (Special Provisions) Bill, are to be enacted in conjunction with the MCC Compact. The proposed Land Bank would bring all publicly owned land under a single entity, making it available to private investors including foreign parties. The proposed Land (Special Provisions) Bill would grant absolute title to state lands held by citizens holding land grants, with validity for seven years.
Proponents claim that the distribution of a million deeds granting outright ownership is a poverty-alleviation measure. However, critics such as MONLAR (Movement for Land and Agricultural Reform) see a setup for a massive land grab, displacement and pauperization: … large multinational companies have made small-time farmers bankrupt and are buying off their agricultural land…. By giving desperate people an asset that they can sell, the government has ensured that these lands will be sold off.”
The Foreign Ministry is attempting to hand over the task of drawing land survey maps and creating a streamlined database of 3.6 million parcels of state-owned land to Trimble Inc, a US-based geological information system and mapping firm, for 15 years. Survey Department trade unions have gone on strike opposing this move, which local surveyors see as a threat to their employment and national security and a wasteful expenditure.
Neither the MCC Agreement nor the new Sri Lanka Physical Plan (2018-2050) associated with the compact have yet been made public. The State Land (Special Provisions) Bill too has not been submitted to cabinet approval because of its alleged connection to the MCC. This lack of transparency has raised grave concerns among the public and the Sri Lankan diaspora regarding US control over vital resources of land and transportation and its impact on the local economy, the environment, and social and cultural norms.
A projected Physical Spatial Structure Map for 2050, details of which have been leaked to the public, has sparked fears that the economic corridor” proposed by the compact for the Trincomalee-Colombo highway could splinter Sri Lanka into two separate entities under the control of the United States, resulting in the loss of sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity.
The US-backed Sri Lankan prime minister, Ranil Wickramasinghe, has reportedly signed the MCC Agreement, but President Maithripala Sirisena has refused to do so. The US ambassador in Sri Lanka, Alaina Teplitz, has written to the president urging him to sign. The US seems to be in a hurry to seal the deal before a new government that is less friendly toward Washington comes into office by 2020.
Meanwhile, local activist groups such as the National Joint Committee and Sri Lankan diaspora activist groups such as SPUR (Society for Peace, Unity and Human Rights for Sri Lanka) Australia are demanding that the government immediately reveal the contents of the agreement without any redactions to the general public. They are encouraged by the decision made by the Sri Lankan Supreme Court on the State Lands (Special Provisions) Bill in last month referring the act to the provincial councils, as it would impact passage of land provisions envisaged in the MCC Compact. As the coalition of expatriate groups Sri Lankans in USA/Amerikawe Api put it:
We welcome the Supreme Court decision, as it will put a hold on the land project of the Millennium contract.… The American public is not even aware of how our government is using our tax dollars to benefit large corporations under the guise of foreign aid to developing countries. We would like to see the entire compact terminated… We are calling for full transparency and debate, both in Sri Lanka and here in the US, about the impact of MCC as well as SOFA and ACSA.”
Acquisition and Cross Services Agreement
The previous Sri Lankan government signed an Acquisition and Cross Services Agreement (ACSA) with the United States, without parliamentary approval, during its armed conflict with the LTTE. The US Defense Department and the Sri Lankan Ministry of Defense entered another ACSA on August 4, 2017. While the 2007 ACSA was valid only for seven years, the new agreement is open-ended. While the 2007 ACSA permitted US military vessels to enter Sri Lanka ports on a one-off’ basis, the 2017 ACSA again appears to be open-ended. Whereas the 2007 ACSA was only eight pages, the 2017 ACSA is said to be 83 pages long with more than 50 annexes listing US commands and military establishments allowed to use Sri Lanka’s airports and seaports.
The 2017 agreement is designed to facilitate reciprocal logistic support between the US and Sri Lanka for use during combined exercises, training, deployments, port calls, operations, or other cooperative efforts, or for unforeseen circumstances or exigencies in which one of the parties may have a need for logistic support, supplies and services.” Reportedly, it allows every security or military apparatus in the US access to Sri Lanka, making the country the main supply hub for US armed forces in the Indo-Pacific region. Analysts argue that if it is fully implemented, it will effectively undermine the Chinese share of geopolitical control in Sri Lanka, by way of military presence in the country.”
The Sri Lankan cabinet approved ACSA 2017 hastily without careful examination or discussion under pressure from US-backed Sri Lankan officials. ACSA was approved without thorough study by armed forces commanders and officials who have serious reservations over some of its provisions. ACSA was not presented to Parliament. President Sirisena’s cabinet memorandum of June 30, 2017, in Sinhala had only a brief nine pages and no annexes. The president is now opposed to the ACSA and claims that he did not know the difference between new” and old” ACSA agreements at the time of signing.
The signing of ACSA was shrouded in secrecy without media coverage or publicity, reportedly as directed by Atul Keshap, US ambassador in Sri Lanka at the time. The renewed ACSA has not been made public despite requests for transparency by opposition political parties, the president of the Bar Association of Sri Lanka (BASL), and others. The joint opposition in Parliament, the JVP (Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna) and Yuthukama civil-society organization, strongly protested against the signing of the ACSA.”
Status of Forces Agreement
The Sri Lankan government signed a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) with the United States in 1995 during the armed conflict to facilitate training of Sri Lankan security forces by US officials. The United States has requested that the Sri Lankan government accept a new SOFA expanding the 1995 SOFA by including an Annex B. Unlike the already signed ACSA, the new SOFA will not be limited to purchase of goods and services and will include rules governing US military personnel in Sri Lanka.
The Sunday Times published the draft SOFA on June 30, revealing that it would provide full diplomatic immunity not only to any member of the US armed forces, but also to contractors and employees of US armed forces operating in Sri Lanka. US army personnel could be present in any part of Sri Lanka without any restrictions and carry arms in uniform. They could enter and leave Sri Lanka with US identification, in other words, without passports or visas.
US army personnel could be present in any part of Sri Lanka without any restrictions and carry arms in uniform. They would be above Sri Lankan law and not be liable for criminal offenses in Sri Lanka
They would be above Sri Lankan law and not be liable for criminal offenses in Sri Lanka. They would be exempted from all taxes and checking at ports of entry and exit to the island. The US Department of Defense may not be subject to any local taxes for any material, supplies, equipment and services (including construction) they contract in Sri Lanka. The US Department of Defense would also be allowed to operate its own telecommunication systems in Sri Lanka without cost to the US government.
The draft SOFA sent on August 28, 2018, by the US Embassy to the Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry stated that acceptance of the draft ”shall constitute an agreement between the two governments, which shall enter into force on the date of [the] ministry’s reply.” This meant that once the secretary of the Ministry of Foreign affairs of Sri Lanka says Yes,” the agreement is effective. The US Embassy has said that once the Sri Lankan government agrees, it has to stick by it. In other words, there would be no room for the SOFA to be discussed by Sri Lanka’s defense officials or debated in the Sri Lankan Parliament.
The SOFA has been temporarily stayed by the Sri Lankan president. With ACSA already signed and SOFA pending, US security companies, notably Sallyport, are already running ads to recruit US citizens with active top secret clearance” to work for US defense operations in Sri Lanka.
Outrage over the blatant violation of Sri Lanka’s independence and sovereignty and opposition to the SOFA as well as the ACSA and MCC Compact are mounting across different strata and sectors of Sri Lanka society. The chief of defense staff, the Chamber of Commerce, and the president of the BASL have warned of the dangers SOFA poses to national interests. The political party Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna and the newly formed STOP USA Campaign are organizing media briefings and mass rallies calling for transparency and accountability in making international agreements.
In response to the rising opposition, the US has rebranded” SOFA as a Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA). Engaged in a social-media campaign to protect the agreements, Ambassador Teplitz has stated that the US has no intention to build a military base or establish a permanent military presence in Sri Lanka.” However, as Sri Lankan President’s Counsel M M Zuhair warns, With SOFA in hand, the Americans do not require a military ‘base’ in Sri Lanka … because the whole island will be a US-controlled super-state operating above the Sri Lankan laws….”
Way forward
While the US expects future Sri Lankan governments to respect international obligations taken on by the current US-backed government, the very legitimacy of the MCC Compact, ACSA and SOFA is widely being questioned in Sri Lanka. As eminent analyst Neville Ladduwahetty argues the Supreme Court must rule on procedures to be followed when agreeing to bilateral treaties determining if the procedures adopted are consistent or not with the hard core principles of the constitution” regardless of the contents or with whom the agreements are made. Laduwahetty clearly states that all agreements must have the consent of the Parliament: Any agreement/treaty signed in the name of the people by the executive, ie the president or the cabinet, without the consent of Parliament amounts to a violation of the sovereignty of the people.… Such agreements/treaties have no legitimacy vis-a-vis international law as determined by the Vienna Convention on Law of Treaties of 1969…..”
Notwithstanding the violation of people’s rights and illegitimacy of the proposed amendments, Sri Lankans recognize the importance of maintaining good relationships with the US, China, India and other countries. However, they do not wish to sacrifice the principles of sovereignty, democracy and the rule of law in doing so. In light of the dangers posed by the agreements with the United States, there are calls to reassert the policy of non-alignment that the small nation of Sri Lanka so valiantly championed during the Cold War. The National Joint Committee expresses this call in a letter it has written to the Sri Lankan prime minister regarding the MCC Agreement:
[We are] committed to protect and preserve the unity and territorial integrity of our nation. We believe that Sri Lanka should follow a foreign policy of non-alignment. Due to the fact that Sri Lanka is strategically located in the Indian Ocean, the country needs to remain non-aligned and refrain from getting involved in the geopolitical confrontation that is developing between America and China, through agreements that would enable these countries to gain a foothold in Sri Lanka.”
External aggression and resistance have been Sri Lanka’s historical trajectory. Transcending ethno-religious divide and conquer” policies promoted by external interests, we Sri Lankans have to come together at this critical juncture to protect our precious, beautiful island home.
COLOMBO, Aug 8 (Reuters) – Gotabaya Rajapaksa, a key politician in Sri Lanka’s civil war, has renounced U.S. citizenship, paving the way for him to make a bid on his country’s presidency.
Sri Lanka does not allow dual citizenship and foreign nationals cannot contest elections.
Gotabaya, a defence chief during the civil war that ended in 2009 and the younger brother of former president Mahinda Rajapaksa, announced late April that he would run in the presidential election due later this year.
He is very popular among Sri Lanka’s politically powerful Sinhala Buddhist majority, which accounts for 70 percent of the country’s 21 million population.
“I can say Gotabaya Rajapaksa has renounced his U.S. citizenship,” Basil Rajapaksa, former economy minister and Gotabaya’s brother, told a news conference on Thursday.
Gotabaya, along with his then-president brother Mahinda, is credited with having crushed the Tamil Tiger insurgent group in 2009 but he has also been accused of human rights violations, especially in the closing stages of the 26-year war.
He is facing war-related lawsuits in the United States and the claims had earlier been expected to delay the process of him dropping U.S. citizenship.
Gotabaya has rejected the allegations of human rights abuse.
Basil Rajapaksa’s party, Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna, is widely expected to nominate Gotabaya as its candidate for the presidential election on August 11.
Mahinda Rajapaksa, the current opposition leader, will be named as party chief the same day, Basil said. (Reporting by Shihar Aneez; Editing by Sankalp Phartiyal and Stephen Powell)
I borrow the title of Servaas Storm’s article that appeared in the ‘Institute of New Economic Thinking’ with slight changes for this week’s column. Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe is well-known for his statements, some of which are of special kind, on the economy. He might have made more than 10 in the last four and a half years. If someone reads his statements since 2015, she/he would find that they are logically consistent as the PM follows very closely the arguments of neo-liberal economists of international financial organisations.
Neo-liberalism that has been practised by the two main parties in power has been transformed into a kind of fundamentalism under Ranil Wickremesinghe’s regime. Recently he has informed that his Government if reelected for another five years will build an economy that could fully pay off the loans it takes.
He might have meant both the domestic and the foreign borrowings of the Government. This differs totally and qualitatively from the economic strategy that is aimed at creating an economy in which dependence on borrowing does not arise. Simultaneously, his Government has also announced that the rate of interest would be further reduced before the end of this month. It is a well-known fact that the increase in interest rate under the early part of his regime can be partially attributed to the Central Bank Bond Scam of which perpetrators are also well-known. This week’s column intends to discuss how an easy money policy be linked to build an economy that could fully pay off the loans it is supposed to take.”
Going back to the easy money policy at this moment may be attributed to three reasons. Let me list them first. As Michael Roberts in his Blog noted Interest rates globally hit a new low with negative rates (i.e. interest rates less than zero – so you get paid to borrow!), at their highest share of world Bonds ever.
In Germany and Switzerland, Government Bond yields are negative.” So following this development initiated by the cuts of interest rate by the Federal Reserve System in the US, the economic advisers of the PM might have proposed to follow suit. FRS slashed its rate by 0.25 per cent last week. Secondly, the proposed reduction of interest rate may be a response to the forthcoming election. Interest cost is a significant portion of consumption and investment expenditure so that the Government that badly needs to come to power once again may see that the reduction of interest cost would be a plus factor. Third reason stems directly from the second. Neo-classical economic theory posits that the reduction of interest rate will have positive impact on investment as it tends to increase profitability.
Rate of Interest and Rate of Investment
We have witnessed this same policy of slashing interest rate and maintaining negative interest rate at least for some sectors of the economy was adopted in the last phase of Mahinda Rajapaksa regime. The policy makers lamented that in spite of the fact that the real interest rate (nominal interest rate – rate of inflation) was negative or closer to zero, there was no increase in investment.
That low interest rate would increase investment and boost economic growth is a neoclassical myth. Of course, the decline of the interest rate may reflect the competitive position of the manufacturing bourgeoise over the bourgeoisie in the financial sector. As Michael Roberts has informed us, But will cutting interest rates avoid a recession in the ‘real’ economy? Everywhere the ‘hard data’ are showing a sharp slowdown in economic growth, a collapse of the world car industry, and outright slumps in many large so-called emerging economies.
Above all, there is a significant contraction in world trade as the trade and technology war instigated by the US against China hots up.”
In spite of the presence of these hard data, the Prime Minister and his economic pundits expect that artificial manoeuvring of the interest rate using the Central Bank would boost economic growth and contribute to create a so-called creditable economy. This is a myth. However, it does not mean that it would have some positive effects over the sectors that experienced a noticeable decline as a result of 21 April terrorist attacks.
The Political Economy of Money
I wish to quote extensively Michael Roberts’ excellent diagnosis of the capitalistic system with regard to the behaviour of money and the real economy. He writes: We all have read articles in the newspapers ‘explaining’ that the Central Bank ‘sets’ the rate of interest. Yet the Central Bank controls neither the quantity of metallic money, the quantity of real capital, nor the rate of profit. Therefore, the ability of the Central Banks to influence interest rates is far less than, what the ‘lay’ public – as many economists – believe it to be.
What today’s Central Banks really control is not the rate of interest but the quantity of token money, measured not in terms of real money – gold – but in terms of dollars, pounds, euros and so on. As the bourgeois media ‘explains,’ they can create ‘any amount of money they wish’ in terms of dollars, pounds, euros and so on. But what good does that do if this money loses its purchasing power even faster than it is printed?
True, the Central Banks generally raise the interest rate during economic booms. But this is exactly the natural tendency of interest rates during economic upswings. Therefore, when they raise interest rates during a boom, they are simply following the tendency of the market, not determining it.”
So what the Prime Minister is proposing is that in the near future there would be an increase in money supply, both token money and credit money. Hence, money supply would increase and as a result, the fiscal deficit will boost up exceeding the limits of Mangala Samaraweera’s Second Budget. None of these policies will resolve the generalised economic crisis or the social, political and cultural crises associated with it. Rather the crisis would aggravate hitting the lives of the people hard, especially of the lower rung of society.
(The writer is a retired teacher of Political Economy at the University of Peradeniya.) E-mail: sumane_l@yahoo.com)
The Commissioner General of Examinations recently announced the candidates not to sit for the G.C.E. Advanced Level Examination wearing hijab due to the situation which prevailed in the country recently.
Yet, as reported, some students in several schools of the Eastern Province, have been seen wearing hijab during the examination.
Accordingly, some have complained that the rules and regulation of the examination have been violated by the above mentioned students who were wearing the hijab during the time of examination.
As reported, exam frauds have been committed by some of these students who were wearing the hijab.
Decisive discussions between President Maithripala Sirisena and Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa to form a broad alliance, between the SLFP and the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna, to contest the next Presidential Poll were successfully concluded, informed sources said yesterday (06). These talks were held following stalled discussions in the recent past.
Talks had ended on a cordial note and both leaders decided to inform colleagues to continue ongoing discussions between the two Parties before forming a strong and viable political alliance to contest the upcoming Polls. Sources said they decided to instruct the Parliamentarians of both Parties on how to conduct further talks and formulate a future alliance. Discussions had taken place from 9.30 p.m. to 10.30 p.m. on 05 August at the former’s Malalasekera Mawatha residence.
Avocados are rich in antioxidants which can help prevent fine lines and wrinkles.
There are many great benefits of avocado – one is that it’s rich in good fats that moisturise your hair. It’s also well absorbed by the hair shafts and scalp.
Bananas are another natural moisturiser. The vitamin A content in bananas helps to restore lost moisture and repair damaged, dull, and dry skin.
Yes, bananas are packed with potassium – great for improving the natural elasticity of your hair and preventing breakage.
Olive oil not only acts as a hydrator but as a shield to lock in any moisture that the hair already has.
Ingredients:
* Half of an Avocado
* Half of a very ripe banana
* One tablespoon olive oil
* 2-3 drops essential oil (optional)
Directions:
1. Peel banana and avocado and place in bowl
2. Add olive oil.
3. Add essential oil (if desired).
4. Mash ingredients and mix well. You can mash with a wooden spoon, potato masher, or food processor.
Application:
1. Drape a towel over chest to absorb excess drips.
2. Rub the avocado face mask all over your face, avoiding your eyes.
3. Allow mixture to sit on your face for 10-15 minutes.
The 53rd Jalsa Salana (Annual
Convention) of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in the United Kingdom concluded
on Sunday 04 August 2019 with faith inspiring addresses of his five speeches.
by the World Head the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, the Fifth Khalifa
(Caliph), His Holiness Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad.
The Convention began on Friday with the traditional Friday Sermon
and the first session started with raising of the black and white flag of the
Ahmadiyya Muslim Community alongside the Union Flag. On Saturday (the second
day of the event), the Caliph conducted proceedings from the ladies marquee
where 15,000 Muslim women witnessed. His Holiness awarded prizes to women
for academic achievements and delivered a speech highlighting the solution for
peaceful married life based on the rights and empowerment Islam affords them.
More than 39,000 people from number of countries
attended this three day Convention ( Jalsa Salana), which took place at
Hadeeqatul Mahdi in Alton, Hampshire.
Apart from the thousands of Ahmadi Muslims
who participated, many non-Ahmadi and non-Muslim guests also
attended. The entire event was also broadcast live on MTA
International and streamed online.
One of the highlights of the three-day
Convention was the pledge of allegiance, known as Bai’at that
took place on Sunday afternoon, {last day of the event} where the participants
pledged allegiance to Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad as the Fifth Khalifa (Caliph)
of the Promised Messiah – Hazrat Mirza Ghlam Ahmad(peace be upon him).
The participants formed a human chain
leading to the Khalifa as they repeated the words of the pledge in unison.
Prior to the ceremony, His Holiness
announced that 668520 people had joined the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community during
the past year representing 120 countries around the world. He also announced
that the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community was now established in 213 countries. The
event concluded with silent prayer led by His Holiness Hazrat Mirza Masroor
Ahmad.
India has a more humanitarian approach towards drug offenders than its neighbours Bangladesh and Sri Lanka
After a moratorium of 43 years, the gallows were getting ready in Sri Lanka. Two executioners with ‘excellent moral character’ and ‘mental strength’ were appointed. A list of four convicts — involved in drug offences — to be hanged was prepared. On June 26 — the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking — the Sri Lankan president, Maithripala Sirisena, announced that he had signed the requisite documents for the imposition of the death penalty for drug-related offences.
But these executions had to be stalled. The country’s Supreme Court, on July 5, issued a temporary injunction against the execution of the four convicts until October.
It is only an interim relief for the convicts, as Sirisena, who is likely to fight a re-election in December, looks adamant upon imposing the death penalty. A week after the parliamentarian, Bandula Lal Bandarigoda, submitted a private member’s motion seeking to block the return of capital punishment, Sirisena, on July 14, said he will declare a national day of mourning if the Sri Lankan Parliament blocks his proposal to reinstate the death penalty. Sirisena, it seems, wants to rely on the populist rhetoric against the threat of drug use and convince people about his ‘social commitment’ to eradicating the menace before the elections. He wants the hangings to be a ‘powerful’ message to the illegal drug trade.
According to government data, 60 per cent of the 24,000 prisoners in Sri Lanka are drug offenders. Currently, 48 people have been convicted of drug offences. All death penalties for drug convicts in Sri Lanka were commuted to life imprisonment for the past 43 years. The death penalty for drug-related offences is a violation of Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Sri Lanka is a party. Ironically, last year, Sri Lanka was among the 121 countries that endorsed a United Nations general assembly resolution calling for a moratorium on the death penalty.
Human rights bodies argue that punitive drug policy has not acted as a deterrent anywhere. Over 170 countries are said to have either abolished the death penalty or taken a position in favour of ending executions. But Sirisena is in no mood to listen. He even rejected an appeal by the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, to reconsider his decision. He has also demanded the death penalty for the perpetrators of the Easter Sunday attacks in April that killed over 258 people by calling the attack the handiwork of international drug dealers” who wanted to discourage [his] anti-narcotics drive”.
Besides Sri Lanka, Bangladesh is another south Asian country which imposes the death penalty for drug offences. Last year, its Parliament passed the narcotics control bill, 2018 which, alongside the life sentence, also has a death row provision for producing, trading and using 200 grams or more of yaba, or more than 25 grams of heroin and cocaine. Human rights bodies demanded a revocation of the law but their voices remained unheard. Two death sentences for drug trafficking were pronounced last year. Ahead of the general elections in December 2018, the prime minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina Wajed, adopted a populist anti-drug stance by launching a campaign to toughen punishments for drug crimes. More than 250 people were killed in anti-drug operations between May and December in 2018. The Philippines-style ‘war on drugs’ campaign has targeted the poor and underprivileged. In some cases, human rights activists alleged, the killings may have been ‘politically motivated’.
In contrast, India has a more humanitarian approach towards drug offenders. In 2011, the Bombay High Court declared Section 31A of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985, that imposed a mandatory death sentence for a subsequent conviction for drug trafficking, ‘unconstitutional’. Later, it made the imposition of capital punishment on a person convicted only for a subsequent offence involving possession, production or transportation of specified drugs and quantities optional and not obligatory.
The Death Penalty for Drug Offences: Global Overview 2018, published by Harm Reduction International — a London-based NGO working on social and legal impacts of drug use and drug policy — stated that only six of 915 death sentences pronounced in India from 2011 onwards were for drug offences. Last year, the Punjab government called for expanding the death penalty that is currently applicable for child rape convicts to first-time drug offenders. But the Central government rejected it, arguing that the UN office on drugs and crime opposes the imposition of the death penalty for drug offences. Moreover, last year, the Congress parliamentarian, Shashi Tharoor, introduced a private member’s bill in Parliament seeking a total abolition of the death penalty.
But the Indian Parliament, last week, passed the protection of children from sexual offences (amendment) bill, 2019, seeking to impose the death penalty for aggravated sexual assault against children. This bill has been passed at a time when a girl, allegedly raped by a former leader of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party when she was a minor in 2017, is battling for life in hospital. Ironically, the BJP, which supports the death penalty and proclaims its love for the ‘betis’ of India, expelled the rape accused from the party only last week, more than a year after his arrest.
The Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) investigating the Easter Sunday terror attacks has reportedly decided to summon members of the Special Investigation Committee (SIC) appointed by President Maithripala Sirisena to testify on 20 August.
The SIC comprises Supreme Court Judge, Justice Vijith K. Malalgoda, former IGP N.K. Ilangakoon and former Law and Order Ministry Secretary Padmasiri Jayamanne.
According to PSC sources, SIC members had been informed to come before the PSC tomorrow (08). However, the date had to be changed due to pre-scheduled businesses of some PSC members.
Both Ilangakoon and Jayamanne testified before the PSC on 25 July. When questioned about matters relating to the SIC, they said they could not divulge information about the SIC.
Meanwhile, a PSC member said the PSC was not sure whether Justice Malalgoda would accept the summons. However, as SIC Chair, he could nominate other members to testify. Even if one member from the SIC comes, we are ready to question him, he added.
He also said the PSC would decide whether to request President Sirisena to come before the PSC after that.
The President appointed the SIC on 21 April. It commenced work on 22 April.
A petition has been filed at the Supreme Court seeking a ruling that the Private Member’s Bill presented to the parliament by MP Bandulal Banadarigoda on the abolishment of the death penalty is not unconstitutional.
The Attorney General has been named the respondent of this petition file by Prof. C. Gunaratne from Nugegoda.
On August 01, MP Bandulal Bandarigoda tabled a Private Member’s Motion at the parliament containing provisions to abolish the death penalty.
The petitioner pointed out that no clause in the proposal would violate the Constitution of Sri Lanka.
Accordingly, the petitioner has requested the Supreme Court to grant a ruling that the motion could be passed by an ordinary majority in Parliament.
Thanks to the ongoing Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on Easter Sunday attacks, the All Ceylon Makkal Congress (ACMC) leader and Vanni District lawmaker, Rishad Bathiudeen, is no longer under heavy fire over his alleged involvement with the now-proscribed National Thowheed Jamaat (NTJ).
The government proscribed the NTJ on May 13, 2019 – 23 days after the Easter carnage. The Jama’athe Milla’athe Ibrahim (JMI) and the Willayath As Seylani (WAS) were also banned in terms of regulation 75(1) of the emergency regulations.
Bathiudeen held the Industry and Commerce, Resettlement of Protracted Displaced Persons, Co-operative Development, Vocational Training & Skills Development at the time of the April 21, 2019, suicide bombing campaign.
Bathiudeen earned the wrath of the Joint Opposition (JO), a section of the Buddhist clergy, and some civil society groups, after Army Chief, Lt. Gen. Mahesh Senanayake revealed the controversial politician’s intervening, on behalf of a person, arrested by the Army, in connection with the Easter attacks and subsequently handed over to the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID). Had Lt. Gen. Senanayake refrained from exposing Bathiudeen, he wouldn’t have attracted media attention. At one point, Bathiudeen, under fire from opponents, revealed he got in touch with Lt. Gen. Senanayake on the advice of State Defence Minister, Ruwan Wijewardene.
The PSC never bothered to seek confirmation from Bathiudeen as regards Wijewardene’s advice when the beleaguered lawmaker appeared before the parliamentary body, on June 28, 2019.
Bathiudeen identified the arrested person as a son of an advisor to Postal Services and Muslim Religious Affairs Minister M.H.A. Haleem, an UNPer elected from the Kandy district. Baithiudeen, Haleem and seven other Muslims, gave up their ministerial portfolios,on June 03, 2019.
Bathiudeen received the same portfolios on July 29, 2019. Haleem and UNP Chairman Kabir Hashim broke ranks with the group of Muslim colleagues to, once again, accept, on June 19, 2019, the ministerial portfolios they held at the time of the blasts.
For almost three months, Bathiudeen was flayed over the Easter Sunday attacks. However, shocking revelations, regarding the negligence on the part of the TID, the Attorney General’s Department, as well as the IGP, made before the PSC in the last week of July and the first week of August 2019, diverted the attention from Bathiudeen.
Those who believed the PSC was meant to clear Bathiudeen, through some trickery, and place the blame on President Maithripala Sirisena, were quite surprised by disclosures of negligence on the part of the police and the AG Department.
With pressure being eased, the indomitable politician, last week, launched a propaganda project to counter criticism directed at him. Interestingly, the media never targeted his party. Instead, Bathiudeen was relentlessly lambasted, both in and outside parliament, until what transpired before the PSC, pointed the finger at the TID, the AG Department and the IGP.
The PSC consists of Ananda Kumarasiri (UNP/Moneragala District), Ravi Karunanayake (UNP/Colombo), Dr. Rajitha Senaratne (UNP/Kalutara), Ashu Marasinghe (UNP National List), Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka (UNP National List), LSSPer Dr. Jayampathy Wickremaratne (UNP National List), M.A. Sumanthiran (TNA/Jaffna District) and Rauff Hakeem (UNP/Kandy District).
The PSC, or Catholic Church, or the civil society, never really inquired about as to why the NTJ deliberately targeted the Tamil community. At least 60 Tamils perished and over 100 wounded in suicide attacks directed at Zion Church, in Batticaloa, and the Tamil service conducted at St. Anthony’s Church, Kotahena.
As the TID and the AG Department struggled to cope up with embarrassing disclosures, Bathiudeen went on the offensive. The Illankai Thamil Arasu Kadchi-led Tamil National Alliance (TNA) never condemned the attack on the community. Instead, TNA heavyweight, M.A. Sumanthiran, at an event held at the BMICH, on April 29, 2009, justified the TNJ terror project.
Archbishop of Colombo Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith rejected Sumanthiran’s assertion that the failure on the part of Sri Lanka’s successive governments, to address the grievances of minorities, over the past several decades, had led to the Easter Sunday carnage.
Sumanthiran alleged that the Easter Sunday carnage was a result of Sri Lanka’s failure to ensure certain basic values. President’s Counsel Sumanthiran warned of dire consequences unless the government addressed the grievances of minorities.
Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, who was present on that occasion, had no qualms naming him to the PSC. Dr. Deepika Udagama, Chairperson of the Human Rights Commission, too, was present, in addition to twice President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga. Bathiudeen seems to be on the offensive now. Immediately after resuming his ministerial duties, Bathiudeen launched a scathing attack on Sri Lanka Chamber for not condemning calls to boycott Muslim-owned shops, following the NTJ attacks. His English media outfit, managed by Joseph Thavaraja, reported his comments in a statement headlined ‘Rishad decries Sri Lanka Chamber for keeping mum as racist calls of prejudice erupted nationwide’
The attack on Sri Lanka Chamber was followed by a visit to Mannar where he reassured the Catholic community.
Bathiudeen, on August 01, assured the Bishop of Mannar, Most Reverend Dr. Fidelis Lionel Emmanuel Fernando, and Adikarana Sanganayake of the Northern and Eastern Provinces and Chief Incumbent of Sri Bodhidakshinaramaya, Ven Siyabalagaswewa Vipulasara, of his fullest support to government efforts to eradicate terrorism. The Island coverage of Bathiudeen’s unexpected meeting with the Mannar Bishop prompted Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith to clarify his position with regard to the Easter Sunday carnage.
Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith sent the following statement to The Island in respect of ‘Under fire from Cardinal, Rishad meets Mannar Bishop’ in the August 02, 2019, edition: “I have been intrigued and surprised about the news item appearing on the 1st page and continued on the 4th page of The Island newspaper of Friday, 2nd August 2019. It says: “Under fire from Cardinal, Rishad meets Mannar Bishop” and there is a photo of the Bishop of Mannar greeting Mr. Rishad Bathiudeen. The report further states:”The meeting took place close on the heels of the Archbishop of Colombo, Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, alleging that those responsible for the heinous crime were still free”.
I wish to first of all state that I have never named any particular person as being responsible for the Easter Sunday bomb attack, but have insisted that an independent, impartial and trustworthy inquiry be conducted on this matter and those responsible be exposed. In fact, soon after this attack, a delegation of Muslim Ministers and MPs came to see me and I met Mr. Bathiudeen, who was in this delegation.
So, I think as a responsible newspaper, you should have reported just the fact of Mr. Bathiudeen meeting Bishop Fernando without trying to drag me into the picture. This is to say in the least a mischievous attempt to create an unethical controversy. I think this is against media ethics. I hope this will not happen again and I kindly request you to publish this in your newspaper, giving it the same prominence as the news item, for the sake of truth and, justice.”
Bathiudeen’s media team released a report on him meeting with Vavuniya-based Ven Siyabalagaswewa Vipulasara after the media reported the powwow with the Mannar Bishop.
ACMC cleared
Premier Ranil Wickremesinghe, on July 15, 2019, cleared Baithiudeen of complicity in the Easter Sunday attacks. The declaration was made in Kinniya, Trincomalee, on the basis of police reports. Thavaraja interpreted Premier Wickremesinghe statement in a communiqué, titled ‘Sri Lanka clears ACMC leader Rishad.’
The police certainly acted fast, in Bathiudeen’s case, whereas a complaint made against Zahran Hashim, way back in June 2017, was never investigated. The Attorney General Department, under flak over its own lapses as regards the bungled inquiry into the Zahran’s affair, exposed the entire police department before the PSC. The AG Department team, included Deputy Solicitor General Azath Navavi, who was earlier accused of sitting on the Zahran’s file, along with State Counsel Malik Azeez.
Azath Navavi’s father, M H M Navavi, served the parliament as a member of the UNP National List. The politician quit his seat after having served about half of his five-year term. Of course, Navavi didn’t forget to procure a super luxury Toyota Land Cruiser with a tax exemption amounting to Rs 33 mn before giving another party member the opportunity to receive the massive exemption. The UNP accommodated Navavi on its National List on Bathiudeen’s request. Navavi handed over his letter of resignation to the Secretary General of Parliament, Dhammika Dassanayake, on May 23, 2018. It would be pertinent to mention that UNP leader Wickremesinghe accommodated Navavi on the UNP National List after the people of Puttalam rejected him. Navavi is the only defeated UNP candidate to enter through the National List and the second to quit National List. In January, 2018, SLMC member Mohamed Hafeel Mohamed Salman quit to pave the way for his party to appoint another member. Salman, too, acquired a super luxury Land Cruiser, like most of his colleagues. Most politicians, in the current parliament, preferred Toyoya Land Cruiser, a vehicle with good second hand value.
The National List seems to be part of payoffs at the taxpayers’ expense, the vast majority of who are struggling to make ends meet.
Did Navavi and Salman sell their vehicles like their colleagues? Of the 225 members in parliament, the vast majority sold their duty free vehicles. Attorney-at-law Nagananda Kodituwakku made an abortive bid to have the vehicle permit scam halted.
In spite of the police and the AG Department trying desperately to shift the blame to each other, there is no doubt as to how negligence facilitated the Thowheed project. The police and the AG Department should examine the circumstances leading to an attack, described as worse than any of those carried out by the LTTE during the entire war.
Bathiudeen fights back
Following Bathiudeen’s meeting with the Bishop of Mannar, the media received two separate statements, with pix ,from the ministry. When the writer made inquiries as to why Bathiudeen’s ministry issued two different statements, on the same meeting, it came to light that the controversial politician had hired media specialist Prasanna Adikari, who, until recently, managed Health Minister Dr. Rajitha Senaratne’s media team. Bathiudeen, in spite of having the services of an exceptionally good media team, brought in Adikari as his political opponents stepped up pressure on him. Having been accused of destroying Wilpattu, Bathiudeen was overwhelmed when the JO launched a devastating attack on him over the Easter Sunday attacks. The campaign was essentially based on Lt. Gen. Senanayake’s revelation that Bathiudeen called him thrice to inquire about a terrorist suspect in custody. Interestingly, no one bothered to attack Bathiudeen over him seeking State Defence Minister Wijewardene’s intervention. The arrest of Senior House Officer (SHO) Dr. Seigu Siyabdeen Mohammed Safi, attached to the Kurunegala hospital, on the night of May 24, 2019, over amassing of wealth, in a suspicious manner, amidst accusations he conducted a clandestine sterilization project, was quickly leaked to Bathiudeen. A section of the media reported as to how Bathiudeen nominated Safi to contest the Kurunegala district on the UNP ticket at the last parliamentary election, in August 2015. Safi resigned his post to contest the election. When the electorate rejected him, he was again accommodated on the health staff through a special cabinet paper. There is no doubt Bathiudeen intervened on Safi’s behalf. S.B. Dissanayake and Udaya Gammanpila, of the UPFA, repeatedly accused Bathiudeen and his wife of buying land in the Mannar administrative district over a period of time. However, inquiries revealed that some of the questionable land transactions had taken place before Bathiudeen switched his allegiance to UNP leader Wickremesinghe, in Dec, 2014, in the run up to the presidential poll, the following month.
The JVP accommodated the father of two Thowheed suicide bombers on its 2015 National List. The JVP never explained as to how Mohamed Ibrahim, one of Sri Lanka’s wealthiest businessmen, ended up in its National List. Don’t forget Zahran himself advised those who contested the Batticaloa district, at the last general election, as to how they should conduct the campaign. Zahran’s outfit backed Maithripala Sirisena at the last presidential election.
Struggling to cope up with massive media onslaught, Bathiudeen sought Adikari’s advice as part of his overall efforts to counter the campaign against him. Adikari provided the required wherewithal to meet the media offensive as Bathiudeen prepared to face the PSC. There hadn’t been a previous instance of the police headquarters requesting the public to lodge complaints against a member of parliament. This was in addition to the No-Confidence Motion (NCM) moved by the JO and UNP National List MP Ven Atureliye Rathana against Bathiudeen. However, Ven Rathana engaged in a much publicized fast into death in the Dalada Maligawa premises which, in the end, helped Bathiudeen to survive the NCM. Wickremesinghe, under heavy pressure to sack Bathiudeen over the Easter carnage, too, heaved a sigh of relief for obvious reasons. Citing Ven. Rathana’s fast unto death, launched on May 31, 2019, Bathiudeen resigned on June 03, 2019. Eight other Muslim lawmakers, representing the UNP, SLMC and his ACMC, resigned to express solidarity with the Vanni District MP. They made the announcement at Temple Trees with the blessings of Wickremesinghe. One may ask as to how Ven. Rathana facilitated Bathiudeen’s project. The fast unto death gave an excuse to Bathiudeen to resign. The resignation made the NCM irrelevant as such a move can be made only against a minister. The giving up of ministerial portfolios enabled Bathiudeen to side-step the issue against him.
Adikari served the JVP at the beginning of his career as the media officer for the then Agriculture Minister, Anura Kumara Dissanayake, during President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s tenure as the president. Subsequently, Adikari served the then Media Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa, followed by Tourism Minister Achala Jagoda, North Western Province Chief Minister Dayasiri Jayasekera, Sports Minister Dayasiri Jayasekera, Megapolis and Western Province Development Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka and Health Minister Dr. Rajitha Senaratne before taking over Bathiudeen’s assignment recently.
Bathiudeen’s parliamentary group consists of five members, including him. In spite of the ACMC having just five members, it wielded immense influence. Immediately after Bathiudeen meeting the Bishop of Mannar, the Minister’s media officer, Joseph Thavaraja, in a statement issued quoted the Mannar-based priest, Right Reverend Dr. Fidelis Lionel Emmanuel Fernando, as having said: “Being a Cabinet Minister in the government enables one to render services to the public in a much bigger way. “I commend your decision to return to your Ministerial portfolio. This shall sustain your capacity to serve the public better.” Thavaraja, who handles the English media for Bathiudeen, headlined his statement ‘Rt. Rev Bishop of Mannar commends Rishad for resuming cabinet portfolio.’ How clever?
Bathiudeen entered parliament, in 2001, on the UNP ticket. At that election, he was nominated by the SLMC. Bathiudeen returned to parliament again, at the 2004 April general election, on the UNP ticket. On that occasion, too, he was an SLMC nominee. At the 2010 general election, he contested on the UPFA ticket and was one of the most influential ministers at that time. In spite of the UNP accusing him of clearing Wilppattu and corruption, he was rewarded with the important Trade and Commerce portfolios, following the last parliamentary elections in 2015 August. Bathiudeen switched his allegiance to the UNP, along with the then SLFP General Secretary Maithripala Sirisena, in Dec 2014.
Bathiudeen has now cleared the way for a crucial role in the forthcoming presidential election, scheduled for late Nov-early Dec 2019. The SLMC Chief seems confident that he can proceed with a kingmaker role with the backing of a high profile media campaign. So far, Bathiudeen appears to have succeeded in surmounting the multi-pronged offensive directed at him. Bathiudeen recently took a common stand with Sri Lanka Muslim Congress leader Rauff Hakeem regarding the formation of the National Democratic Front (NDF). Their move, along with other minority parties, in the current dispensation, and the Sajith Premadasa group, compelled the UNP to put on hold the formation of the NDF. All of them want consensus on their candidate before the finalization of the agreement on the NDF. Bathiudeen is obviously back in a high profile political project. Let us await the PSC report on the Easter Sunday carnage, expected to be released before nominations open for the 2019 presidential poll. Will it confirm the Premier’s declaration that the police intelligence cleared him of complicity in the Thowheed project?
Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, MP, yesterday, revealed that he had recently been offered the post of the Deputy Minister of Defence and a Cabinet portfolio by the Minister of Defence.
President Maithripala Sirisena is the Minister of Defence.
The former army chief said that he had turned down the offer because it was intended to silence him. He said he could not keep his mouth shut, given the situation in the country.
Fonseka said so when State Minister for Defence Ruwan Wijewardena told the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) probing the Easter Sunday attacks that the UNP had wanted him to take over the law and order portfolio.
The PSC members present, yesterday, were Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa, Prof. Ashu Marasinghe, Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, M.A. Sumanthiran, Minister Ravi Karunanayake, Chairman Ananda Kumarasiri, Dr. Jayampathi Wickremaratne and Minister Rauff Hakeem.
State Defence Minister Ruwan Wijewardene said that intelligence services had not conveyed any information regarding the warnings of Easter Sunday attacks to him.
Testifying before the Parliamentary Select Committee probing the Easter Sunday carnage, the Minister said he should have been informed of the warning of attack.
The minister said: “There had been disagreements between the Defence Minister who is also the President and the government following the constitutional crisis. Thereafter I was not even invited for the National Security Council meetings.”
Minister Wijewardene: The National Security Council, in 2017, discussed Muslim extremism in Kattankudy. The issue under discussion was that there were rival Islamic groups and some mosques had been attacked. There was no discussion on terrorist activities while I was there. We did not get the warning. The NSC did not discuss any such warning. After the attack the issue was discussed at the NSC level. We met soon after the attack and took action to mitigate it. I was in contact with the Prime Minister.
M.A. Sumanthiran: Did you chair the NSC meetings?
Minister Wijewardene: I sat as the head, but the meeting was content by the Secretary of Defence. He presented the agenda for the meeting.
Sumanthiran: What was the role of the intelligence heads at the meeting? Isn’t it the purpose of the meeting to share intelligence?
Minister: I think so. We discussed several matters but there was no discussion on the formation of a terrorist group or preparations being make by such a group to launch an attack.
Sumanthiran: There were incidents in Digana in March 2018. Was there any issue related to the radicalization of Islamic groups discussions?
Minister Wijewardene: We discussed the factions.
Sumanthiran: When did you attend the last NSC meeting before Oct 2018?
Minister: I attended the NSC meetings before the Constitutional Crisis. I did not attend the NSC meetings during the crisis time. I was not invited to NSC meetings thereafter. The last time I attended was on Oct 7, 2018. Thereafter I attended the meetings of national intelligence only in April 2019.
Sumanthiran: Did you ask why you had not been invited
Minister Wijewardene: I asked the Secretary Defence. He told me that there had been no NSC meetings per se. The President had met only the persons heading various security establishments.
Sumanthiran: Apart from the secretary defence, did you ask your minister, who is also the President?
Wijewardene: No, I did not. I believed that the situation had arisen after the Constitutional Crisis and there were some disagreements between the President and the government. I assumed that I was not invited as a result.
Sumanthiran: How about Intelligence review meetings? Did you ask about that?
Minister: I asked the Defence Secy. He told me that I would be called for the meetings after mid-March.
Sumanthiran: Did you know that such meetings took place?
Minister: The usual procedure was for the Defence Secretary to contact my secretary and inform him such meetings. That didn’t happen.
Sumanthiran: Usually, where did such meetings take place?
Minister: At the Ministry of Defence
Sumanthiran: Your office is at the same ministry. When such meetings take place in the same ministry did you not ask you had been overlooked?
Minister: I was not invited or I was not asked not to come to those meetings.
Minister Karunanayake: Do you think that there was a serious lapse of coordination?
Minister Wijewardene: Absolutely, there was a serious lapse of coordination. The stability within the Ministry of Defence too was questionable. There had been five secretaries since 2015.
Field Marshal Fonseka: Was there any other responsibility apart from the duties assigned to you by the Gazette?
Minister: No, I attended the meetings I was asked to I visited foreign countries when I was told. I attended the functions of the forces as the chief guest.
Field Marshal Fonseka: Ceremonial functions?
Minister: Yes
Field Marshal Fonseka: They were not operational?
Minister: No. I did not have decision making powers in operational matters.
Field Marshal Fonseka: But in Parliament when there is a question you are supposed to give answer. You are inconvenienced when you are asked questions in Parliament
Minister: Yes there were occasions where I was inconvenienced.
Field Marshal Fonseka: Did you have any experience in defence related matters before you were given that position?
Minister: No. I did not have defence experience. Now, I have some knowledge since I was in the ministry for the past four years. We wanted you to become the minister of law and order. We had hopes. But that did not work out
Field Marshal Fonseka: I was recently invited to take over deputy minister of defence and a cabinet portfolio. The invitation was sent to me by the Minister of Defence. But I did not take it up because I was expected to take it and keep my mouth shut. But considering the situation now prevailing in the country one cannot take the position and keep the mouth shut. Did Zahran’s name come up or was there any attempt by Intelligence to look into the matter to curb the menace?
Minister: The police had been instructed to continue investigations
Field Marshal Fonseka: There had been instructions to continue investigations. Investigations had been continuing till the bombs went off. Did anyone issue instructions to suppress the operations of the Zahran’s group?
Minister: No such instructions were issued
Field Marshal Fonseka: Don’t you think that if action had been taken early this disaster could have been prevented?
Minister: Yes. Certainly, it could have been prevented. There were several such occasions as far as I know. For example if the Kattankudy police had done their job properly when there were clashes among the two rival Islamic groups on that day, this disaster could have been prevented.
Dr. Jayatissa: You have been given four institutions the Ranaviru Seva Authority, Defence Services Command and Staff College, Defence College and the National Cadet Corps.
Minister: Yes, later on some others including the Civil Defence Force were placed under my purview.
Dr Jayatissa: So the institutions coming under you were not serious enough to be taken for discussion at NSC
Minister: No
Dr Jayatissa: What is the responsibility and role of yours in attending the intelligence review meetings on Tuesday?
Minister: I am asked only to help ensure national security. It is summoned by the Defence Secretary. He prepares the agenda together with the Chief of National Intelligence.
Dr. Jayatissa: On April 9 Director State Intelligence Service sent a letter to CNI and Defence Secretary warning of the attack and where the attack would take place and who would carry out the attack. Did you see it?
Minister: I saw it after the attacks
Dr. Jayatissa: So, the State Defence Minister saw the letter only after the attack, is it so?
Minister: Yes
Dr Jayatissa: You have been provided security by the Ministerial Security Division. They got the letter. Among those who got the letter was the Personal Security Officer assigned to you by the MSD. Didn’t the PSO of yours give that letter to you?
Minister: No, after the attack I summoned the PSO and asked him. He told me that his duty was to protect me not to forward the letters he received. He said he received similar letters occasionally but they only took actions necessary without passing those letters to me.
Dr Jayatissa: What is the nature of relationship between State Minister of Defence and the Director SIS?
Minister: We are in contact. I think he gives us all important information. He decides what he give me. He calls me and gives information that he thinks I should know.
Dr Jayatissa: The SIS Director had the information but he did not pass it on to you, isn’t it so?
Minister: No, I was not given that information.
Dr Jayatissa: What do you think of that now?
Minister Wijewardene: I am saddened by the fact that I was not informed of the warning of attack beforehand. Only after the attack the Director SIS told me that he had received prior information.
Dr Jayatissa: There was information of radical groups operating in the East, and of their terrorist activities. There was information that such groups were organising themselves. Weren’t those threats discussed at the NSC?
Minister: We discussed it but there was no discussion of Islamic fundamentalism developing into terrorism.
Dr Jayatissa: Soon after the attack there was an NSC meeting. At that meeting it was stated that only six out of eight bombs had gone off and there were two more left. There had been also a talk at that meeting that the ministers should protect themselves till the remaining bombs were found.
Minister: Director SIS said so. But there was no talk of ministers increasing their security. But it was mentioned that couple of more bombs would to go off.
Prof Marasinghe: Now, it is clear that you had not been informed of the prior warning till the attack took place. Whom do you think is responsible to provide that information to you?
Minister: Secretary Defence should have done that.
Prof Marasinghe: Who informed you of the attack first?
Minister: The Prime Minister informed me. Then I contacted the Secretary Defence who confirmed it. The Secretary told me that there would be an NSC meeting and asked me to come and attend it. I did so.
By Noor Nizam – Peace and Political Activist, Political Communications Researcher, SLFP/SLPP Stalwart and Convener The Muslim Voice”, August 6th., 2019.
Muslim parliamentarians on behalf of the Muslims of Sri Lanka should denounce this political process in the Indian parliament (Lok Sabah).
It is sad to see a Prime Minister of a Democratic country which is a member of the UN, without “DENOUNCING WHAT INDIA HAS DONE” to wish well to the passing of a bill by the Narendra Modi’s BJP government to oppress the Kashmir people further. The Bill is repealing legislations 35 A which deals with the peoples’ rights in Kashmir and Bill 370 which deals with India’s administration of Kashmir which was put in place on the advice of the British in 1950 just after India was partitioned in 1947. This Prime Minister of ours is playing to the gallery by his tweet published today, hoping that the Buddhist in Sri Lanka will vote him, and his alliance to power at the next presidential election and general elections.
“Ladakh” is mountainous terrain and has the very little (extremely small) population and yes, they are Buddhists. But there are Muslims and Hindus also in that population. Shame on our PM to make such a racial and discriminative “TWEET” telling that India will create a first Buddhist State.
Ranil has failed to respect the Muslim majority Kashmir
which has been now made to suffer and has not made any reference to that
“INJUSTICE”. THE MUSLIMS OF SRI LANKA SHOULD NEVER FORGIVE THIS
SHAMELESS PM OF OURS FOR FORGETTING HOW HE IS STILL SITTING IN THE PM CHAIR
BECAUSE OF THE MUSLIM VOTES THE “HANSAYA” AND THE UNF GOT IN 2015.
“The Muslim Voice” acknowledges the oppression of the Kashmiri People by India over the last 70 years, without conducting the “PLEBICITE” ordered by the UN in 1948. India went to war with Pakistan on the contrary. The BJP government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi proposed Monday revoking Article 370 of India’s constitution, which confers special rights to permanent residents of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. “The Muslim Voice” fully and totally rejects this political move by the BJP government of Narendra Modi and his minister of home affairs, Amith Shah. “The Muslim Voice” calls the government of Sri Lanka and all 21 Muslim parliamentarians on behalf of the Muslims of Sri Lanka to denounce this political process in the Indian parliament (Lok Sabah) which is to further oppress the people of Kashmir and deny them democracy further.
We keep watching TV about the daily demonstrations by young generations where male and female students with young monks with overgrown hair. What a waste of energy and valuable time.
In Russia, I remember how the young generation of the same age group in the universities behaved. They are supposed to do service in the forces after school before coming to university or after. Every summer group of youngsters was always sent to villages ( they use to call the farms KOLHOZ-means collective farm ) to either uproot potatoes or pluck cabbages. They loved those trips as they can enjoy a month on a holiday.
I used to work in Norway, where all the youngsters are supposed to go for military training. I had a Sri Lankan friend whose both children served in the military in very cold winter times, When they were back I found the very discipline and progressive mind. Today they are married, buy a house at 24 years and live a disciplined life.
I have a friend in Singapore
who sent his son for military service and now he is a dentist doing well.
In Sri Lanka youngsters can be given the chance to serve in the Military where they are told to join as volunteers in Health, Agriculture, Engineering work, etc so that they have some basic idea where they can continue the education after a 1-2 year service.
It may also be prudent to plan to entice some of them to be monks lime in Thailand so that they learn some spiritual aspects of life!
President is always talking about his strong decisions making actions citing revival of the death penalty .getting rid of drug menace etc.
What he should do is use his
somewhat dictatorial power (whatever left) and initiate national service for
every youngster in the country.
Strict monitoring of their behavior pattern should be carried out and the government should give the option to enter into a suitable education stream.
Whether it is Premadasa or Gota of Nagananda who are aspiring to lead the country, should spell out plan to implement such a program to the people.
The Sri Lankan Prime Minister added that Ladakh’s creation as a Union Territory and its consequential restructuring is “India”s internal matter”.
With over 70% Buddhists, Ladakh will be the first Indian state with a Buddhist majority.
COLOMBO:
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on Tuesday welcomed the Central government’s move to confer Union Territory status on Ladakh, a region with a Buddhist majority.
Taking to Twitter, Mr Wickremesinghe said, “I understand Ladakh will finally become a Union Territory. With over 70% Buddhist it will be the first Indian state with a Buddhist majority.”
The Sri Lankan Prime Minister added that Ladakh’s creation as a Union Territory and its consequential restructuring is “India”s internal matter”.
The Jammu and Kashmir (Reorganisation) Bill, 2019, which strips Jammu and Kashmir’s status of a state and converts it into a Union Territory with legislature and carving out Ladakh region as a Union Territory without legislature, was passed in a division pressed by the Opposition with 125 votes in favour and 61 against, and a National Congress Party member abstaining.
By KRISHAN FRANCIS, ASSOCIATED PRESS Courtesy abc News
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe leaves after testifying in front of a parliamentary committee investigating the Islamic State-inspired Easter Sunday bomb attacks, at the parliament complex in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2019. Wickremesinghe said the coordinated suicide bomb attacks in three churches and three tourist hotels on April 21 were the result of the security apparatus failing to follow the transition of religious extremists into terrorists, adding that the country should prepare itself to face new forms of terrorism prevalent in other countries. (AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena)
Sri Lanka’s prime minister on Tuesday told a parliamentary committee investigating the Islamic State-inspired Easter Sunday bomb attacks that the country should prepare itself for new types of terrorism.
Existing policing, investigative agencies and laws had experience with ethnic Tamil separatists during Sri Lanka’s civil war, but Sri Lanka must now deal with “a new phase of terrorism,” Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in his explanation for what the government should do following criticism that the it failed to act on intelligence from foreign agencies before the attacks that killed more than 250 people.
“The terrorism we see today doesn’t have a central organization, there is no need to conduct classes to recruit people. People join through web sites,” he said.
He added: “A team can come and attack…or it can be done by one person if he makes up his mind to drive a lorry and kill 10 people.”
Wickremesinghe said that he proposed to the Cabinet and obtained a report from members to draft new laws to deal with people who travel to fight in foreign wars and who have gone to terrorist training centers. The laws will be based on British laws drafted from the 2000s until now, Wickremesinghe said.
“The whole existence of the internet and the web has made a big difference, this is a sort of phenomenon of the last 10 years. Not only us, throughout the world, but they are also facing how to deal with this? Some countries have offered to help us, UK and Singapore,” Wickremesinghe said.
Police already knew about some suspects prior to the April 21 suicide bomb attacks at three churches and three tourist hotels but the failure to prevent the attacks was the result of the security system failing to track the transition of religious extremists into terrorists, Wickremesinghe said.
He said that intelligence officials had gathered information before the attacks about some of the suspects and that police had evidence against ringleader Mohamed Zahran to charge him only for hate preaching under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. But police at the time could not locate him and he was thought to have fled to India illegally by boat.
Zahran blew himself up at Shangri La hotel in Colombo.
“Certainly there has been a lapse, I would stay the lapse started toward the end of last year because if they (police) knew a transformation (in religious extremists) was taking place they would have built upon it,” Wickremesinghe said.
Wickremesinghe insisted that he was personally unaware of the prior warnings that had been received and that he has not received a satisfactory answer on why he was not informed.
Sri Lanka still faces a threat even though all members of the group that was directly involved in the conspiracy and the attacks are either dead or arrested, Wickremesinghe said.
Other people who were not involved in the Easter attacks but were indoctrinated and trained may be at large and the government has ordered investigators to arrest and question people who met with members of groups, Wickremesinghe said.
Local Muslim groups National Thowheed Jammath and Jamathei Millathu Ibrahim had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group and are blamed for the suicide attacks that also wounded more than 500.
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