{"id":105803,"date":"2020-08-23T15:55:40","date_gmt":"2020-08-23T22:55:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=105803"},"modified":"2020-08-23T15:55:40","modified_gmt":"2020-08-23T22:55:40","slug":"bring-in-a-new-constitution-without-delay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/08\/23\/bring-in-a-new-constitution-without-delay\/","title":{"rendered":"Bring in a New Constitution Without Delay"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dilrook Kannangara<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

It is obvious the\npresent Constitution is a mess (in local proverbial terms a salad mix of a\nlunatic \u2013 pissige palaa malla\u201d). It contains many contradictory provisions\nthat often require court interpretation. The country cannot move forward\nwithout a seamless Constitution that ties back to history, leverages the\npresent and envisions a future. No government has received a mandate bigger\nthan this regime to bring in a new Constitution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tweaking parts\nof the Constitution for personal gain is not going to help the nation. That was\nthe mistake of Mahinda exactly a decade ago. Instead of defanging the most\nuseless and regressive articles, Mahinda opted to extend his power through the\n18A and wanted to keep the damned Constitution. However, he was stumped just\ntwo years later by 13A opening a can of worms. By then it was too late to\nchange the Constitution again as the regime could not get 50% support at a\nreferendum. His regime didn\u2019t recover from it and was finally put to rest\nanother two years later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having\nlearnt from that experience, President Gotabaya must immediately replace the\nConstitution within this year. It requires a referendum and over 50% of support\nfrom voters. It can be obtained within the next couple of months only.\nThereafter public support will collapse below 50%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new\nConstitution must be a homegrown Constitution. It must not attempt to appease\nIndia, USA, UNHRC, Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam or any other alien\nbody. It must essentially enforce one law for all irrespective of religion,\nethnicity, caste, origin, gender or place. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

District\nboundaries (and provincial boundaries if provincial councils are to remain)\nmust be changed to suit historical realities and present day facts on ground.\nTrincomalee Port area must be part of Anuradhapura or Polonnaruwa Districts as\nit was throughout history. It was the case not only when Sinhala kings ruled\nRajarata but also when Tamil kings ruled it. That should also include Sinhala\nmajority areas like Seruwila.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Local\ngovernment boundaries also require change. Colombo City must be re-demarcated\nto reflect national population percentages. Otherwise the most important and\nwealthiest local government body is decided upon by a minority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since 1972\nBuddhism was awarded the foremost place in the Constitution. However, it was\nconfined to Article 9. Buddhism has no relevance beyond Article 9!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The present\nConstitution has no vision whatsoever for the future of the nation. Instead it\nfocuses only on day to day affairs. The next Constitution must be futuristic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wish\nGotabaya all success in enacting a new Constitution that brings everyone under one\nlaw, gives the due place to Buddhism it deserves and connects the glorious past\nto the present and from there to the future. It must be done soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dilrook Kannangara It is obvious the present Constitution is a mess (in local proverbial terms a salad mix of a lunatic \u2013 pissige palaa malla\u201d). It contains many contradictory provisions that often require court interpretation. The country cannot move forward without a seamless Constitution that ties back to history, leverages the present and envisions a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dilrook-kannangara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}