{"id":58969,"date":"2016-09-21T21:08:22","date_gmt":"2016-09-22T03:08:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=58969"},"modified":"2016-09-21T03:02:07","modified_gmt":"2016-09-21T10:02:07","slug":"constitutional-reforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/09\/21\/constitutional-reforms\/","title":{"rendered":"CONSTITUTIONAL REFORMS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Janaki Chandraratna<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>Constitutional Reforms is the hot topic of the day. The government is fast tracking this agenda to be in line with the timeline prescribed by UNCHR, as constitutional reforms are considered to be imperative to implement the Geneva resolution. Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, in his last visit to Sri Lanka, informed Sri Lanka of the need to pass the new constitution before the end of 2016, in order to hold the referendum in January 2017. Although the government had not shed any light on this timeframe or answered the relevant parliamentary questions, it had set the ball rolling on constitutional reforms agenda since late last year.<\/p>\n

In December 2015, a Steering Committee comprising of five sub committees was set up under the direction of the PM with the approval of the Cabinet to deliberate on the five main aspects of the new constitution (i.e. Fundamental Rights, Judiciary, Law and Order, Centre Periphery Relations, and Public Finance). Despite the government having a 2\/3 majority in Parliament, steps were taken to convert the parliament to a National Assembly for the purposes of passing the new constitution. In addition, a 20 member Public Representation Committee (PRC) was appointed with nominees from political parties and NGO representations to obtain public submissions for changes to the constitution.<\/p>\n

The final report of the PRC with recommendations was presented to the PM in May 2016. This report included several options for government consideration, some of which were on sensitive matters such as nature of the state, power sharing and devolution. People have learnt from snippets of information in the newspapers that the Steering Committee sub committees have also given their respective reports to the PM and the draft constitution will be presented to the parliament before the end of 2016.<\/p>\n

The government no doubt is enthused by the passage of the Office of Missing Persons Act (OMP) without debate or a vote. Apart from the deplorable undemocratic process followed for this bill, it was ironic to note that even the parliamentarians that supported the bill like the JVP were unaware of its contents. Yet, the bill appears to have seen the light of the day as the law of the country. Needless to say the undemocratic processes followed, the silence on the OMP and Constitution reforms bills, the FCID activity targeting only the opposition members, the disregard of alleged criminal activity of the pro government parliamentarians and the indirect gagging of the press have generated a considerable mistrust against the government in recent times. People cannot be faulted for speculating on the outcomes of constitutional reforms, in the absence of any clarifications from the PM and the President. People fear that the outcome of constitutional reforms will be inimical to the State\u2019s integrity as a sovereign country. Although motherhood statements such as \u2018Nothing untoward will happen to the sovereignty of the country\u2019, is convincing to Ven. Malwatta, Thero, they do not offer any consolation to the general public. These statements only intensify the skepticism of the average citizen. The occasional quips by the PM on the irrevocable devolution of power to the North and East through constitutional reforms have also aggravated the situation.<\/p>\n

The engagement of NGOs and the lack of participation of the country\u2019s intellectuals in the constitution reform process are a concern to the average citizen. Declarations of Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu that foreign funded NGOs had led to a disproportionate interference in the internal affairs of sovereign states have added to the fears of the nation. People are also apprehensive of the latest approach of the President and PM to fast forward the marketing of national reconciliation and power sharing strategies through constitutional reforms. Newspaper snippets indicate that NGOS have already organized a marketing strategy at the district levels in readiness for the referendum. As far as the average citizen is concerned however, the new constitution is still being drafted and if that is the case they query the need for a marketing program before the drafting of the new constitution is completed. There is speculation that the constitution is already been drafted by foreign funded NGOs that support the division of the country. Against this background, it appears that the opposition has a daunting task of informing the public of the possible dangers that need to considered, for the referendum, in particular, if there is power sharing at the periphery without adequate controls in the center to prevent any division in the country by separatist movements. This task is becoming difficult by the increased FCID investigations against opposition members.<\/p>\n

The government can be expected to invest heavily on a marketing campaign for constitutional reforms as the defeat of the referendum would be a \u2018do or die\u2019 outcome for the government similar to Brexit for the British government. It is envisaged that there would be an overload of information and a barrage of propaganda from both the government as well as the opposition leading up to the referendum. The only way out for Sri Lankans is to examine the potential impacts of both the letter and the spirit of the proposed laws marketed as constitutional reforms so that informed decisions can be taken at the referendum. It is also essential that people undertake a conscience vote and not be distracted by party politics if they are to safeguard the country for future generations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Janaki Chandraratna \u00a0Constitutional Reforms is the hot topic of the day. The government is fast tracking this agenda to be in line with the timeline prescribed by UNCHR, as constitutional reforms are considered to be imperative to implement the Geneva resolution. Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, in his last visit to Sri […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-constitution"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58969","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=58969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58969\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}