{"id":96118,"date":"2019-12-09T00:53:06","date_gmt":"2019-12-09T06:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=96118"},"modified":"2020-02-04T15:56:42","modified_gmt":"2020-02-04T22:56:42","slug":"president-gotabaya-rajapakse-pl-ask-225-mps-to-present-affidavits-to-confirm-they-are-not-dual-citizens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/12\/09\/president-gotabaya-rajapakse-pl-ask-225-mps-to-present-affidavits-to-confirm-they-are-not-dual-citizens\/","title":{"rendered":"President Gotabaya Rajapakse \u2013 pl ask 225 MPs to present affidavits to confirm they are not DUAL CITIZENS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It was the yahapalana\ngovernment that brought and passed the 19a in April 2015 with key clause that\nno MP should be a dual citizen. The onus is definitely on them to prove that\nnone of them were dual citizens when inserting this clause which was primarily\nto prevent Gotabaya Rajapaks from harboring intent to contest elections. The\nmanner their cohorts went to file cases to prevent nominations being accepted\nis a case in point. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We now need to ask who in this\ngood governance government inserted this 19a clause while hiding the fact that\nthey were themselves dual citizens?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Article 92(b) and Clause 20(4) of the\n19a and Article 91(1)(d)(XIII) of the Constitution says persons who are dual\ncitizens are DISQUALIFIED from being elected as MPs or the President. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This means even after entering Parliament\nthey cannot obtain dual citizenship. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what was the purpose in\ninserting a clause when only 1 MP declared she was a dual citizen at nomination\nand her honesty led to her being dismissed from Parliament?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are now asking if there are MPs in\nParliament who are DUAL CITIZENS but have WITHHELD that information when\nfilling their nomination papers. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is un-parliamentary and if\nit has been done by any party\/politicians who were supporters of 19a then it is\ndaylight hypocrisy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If a clause was inserted to deny a MP or a President to\nbe dual citizen it was only right that ALL of them be asked to declare they are\nNOT DUAL CITIZENS.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The President of Sri Lanka was\nmade to face embarrassing and humiliating court cases with \u2018dual citizens\u2019\nquestioning if he was a citizen of Sri Lanka to contest elections. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Therefore, the President must now\ndemand that the Parliament that passed this 19a have all MPs declare that they\nare NOT DUAL citizens by affidavit. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other than an affidavit what\nother ways can we know if a MP is a dual citizen?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. The Foreign Ministry can\nrequest selected countries to confirm with their records if any of the 225 MPs\nare dual citizens<\/li>
  2. The Election Commission can\nmake a demand <\/li>
  3. MPs personally admit being dual\ncitizen<\/li>
  4. Immigration confirms their\ntravel details for visa<\/li>
  5. Defense Ministry confirm\nletters issuing dual citizenship<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    The 19a was passed in April 2015 inserting clause on dual citizenship. Why didn\u2019t the election commissioner ask MPs at time of nominations to produce affidavits that they were not dual citizens instead of relying only on their honesty to admit so. Only Geetha Kumarasinghe when filing nominations admitted to being a dual citizen. She was disqualified because of her honesty. Others who are now MPs while being DUAL CITIZENS cannot be in Parliament because of their dishonesty. If so their PENSIONS should be denied because they acted dishonestly knowing 19a strictly denied anyone contesting elections while being a dual citizen. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    http:\/\/www.dailynews.lk\/2017\/05\/03\/local\/114881\/court-rules-geetha-kumarasinghe-disqualified-mp<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    MPs in Parliament cannot make a\nmockery out of democracy inserting clauses simply to fool the people and not\nadhering to them. We all know that 19a was specifically written to target\nindividuals to prevent them contesting. Shall shallow constitutional amendments\nwere made for petty political agendas. But natural justice must prevail. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Therefore, the President would have realized from his own personal ordeal and the manner his nominations was on a thin line because of 19a must put the ball into Parliament and demand ALL MPs produce AFFIDAVITS THAT THEY ARE NOT DUAL CITIZENS.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Shenali D Waduge<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    It was the yahapalana government that brought and passed the 19a in April 2015 with key clause that no MP should be a dual citizen. The onus is definitely on them to prove that none of them were dual citizens when inserting this clause which was primarily to prevent Gotabaya Rajapaks from harboring intent to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1498,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shenali-waduge"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96118","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\/1498"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96118\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}