{"id":98538,"date":"2020-02-02T19:22:32","date_gmt":"2020-02-03T01:22:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=98538"},"modified":"2020-02-04T15:07:32","modified_gmt":"2020-02-04T22:07:32","slug":"does-sri-lankas-parliament-judiciary-legal-fraternity-realize-mcc-is-clipping-its-powers-for-5-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/02\/02\/does-sri-lankas-parliament-judiciary-legal-fraternity-realize-mcc-is-clipping-its-powers-for-5-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Sri Lanka\u2019s Parliament\/Judiciary\/legal fraternity realize MCC is clipping its powers for 5 years?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Screen-Shot-2020-02-02-at-3.09.47-PM-1024x653.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-98539\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The MCC is not just any ordinary\nagreement. It is an agreement that is signed between 2 Governments, passing 10\nland registries to a newly created company called MCC Sri Lanka Pvt Ltd. So a\ngovernment to government agreement creates a company to which funding is to be\ndisbursed and this company whose aims &amp; objectives have yet to be finalized\nis having its entity passed by Sri Lanka\u2019s Parliament (God knows why), removes\nthe role of the Judiciary to adjudicate and disallows the Citizens any legal remedy\nfor grievance on account of the immunity that MCC\/MCA will be given for 5\nyears. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The fundamental principle in a\ncountry is the functioning of Parliamentary supremacy and the Rule of Law\nexercised by the Constitution &amp; the Judiciary. However, this one agreement\nis clipping the powers of both Rule of Law &amp; Role of Judiciary for 5 years\nand in so doing it is negating the inalienable right of the citizens\u2019\nsovereignty. These are all violations of international code of ethics and laws.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>How will MCC clip the Powers of Sri Lanka\u2019s Parliament \u2013 Judicial \u2013 People?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>MCC proposes to do so in 3 ways:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>By having MCC passed by Parliament enforcing\nSection 80 (3)<\/strong> of the Constitution becomes applicable <em>where a Bill becomes law upon the certificate of the President or the\nSpeaker, as the case may be being endorsed thereon, no court or tribunal shall\ninquire into, pronounce upon or in any manner call in question, the validity of\nsuch Act on any ground whatsoever\u201d<\/em><\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.parliament.lk\/files\/pdf\/constitution.pdf\">https:\/\/www.parliament.lk\/files\/pdf\/constitution.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>By\n<strong>Section 6.8 \u2013 Immunity for MCC <\/strong>wherein\nIMMUNITY clause denies any action by any of Sri Lanka\u2019s Courts against MCC\/MCA\nSri Lanka. Please note: the very quote used in Sri Lanka\u2019s Constitution Section\n80(3) is requoted in MCC Agreement Section 6.8. This means Sri Lanka\u2019s Supreme\nCourt, Court of Appeal, High Court, Magistrate\u2019s Court will have no\njurisdiction to inquire into any loss, damage, injury or even death arising out\nof MCC activities or omissions in Sri Lanka for 5 years. If the judiciary has\nno role it means the lawyers have no role either. Are judges and lawyers aware\nof this scenario?<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Bim Saviya further throttles role of\nJudiciary\/legal fraternity in land adjudications <\/strong>which will be seen when\nall land deeds become registered under Bim Saviya &amp; Sri Lanka\u2019s judiciary\nand land lawyers will find they can no longer adjudicate in land matters. <\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Why does MCC need to\nbe passed by Parliament?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sri Lanka has had many foreign\ninvestments, there are many foreign companies with liaison offices operating in\nSri Lanka but none of these companies have opened shop after having its\noperations passed by Sri Lanka\u2019s Parliament \u2013 so why does MCC need to be passed\nby Parliament? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Why is Parliament ceding its powers to a private company administered\nby a foreign government for 5 years?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>MCC Section 6.8 is devolving\npowers of the Parliament to the MCC\/MCA for a period of 5 years to a totally\nprivate company to do what the State has been thus far elected to do. Is this\nnot a frightening thought? Have Parliamentarians not realized the implications\nof such a hand over?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Why are the I Know the Law\u201d legal fraternity in Sri Lanka silent?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Are they not in a better position\nto read the clauses and understand the implications &amp; dangers for Sri Lanka\u2019s\nsovereignty, for People\u2019s sovereignty, for legal sovereignty of Sri Lanka?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If laymen can understand the\nimpending dangers on 3 fronts \u2013 to Parliament \u2013 to the Judiciary and to the\nPeople\u2019s Sovereignty why is it not being understood by politicians, the Judges,\nthe lawyers and the advisors?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So MCC Agreement is in brief\nusurping Parliament\u2019s powers for 5 years, Judicial powers for 5 years and People\u2019s\npowers for 5 years because when passing MCC agreement in Parliament Section 80\nwill come into effect which means any Bill that comes into law cannot be\nchallenged. So the people\u2019s sovereignty is also usurped by MCC for the next 5\nyears.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Are we to revisiting 1815 with this handover of our sovereignty for a\npaltry $480million? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Sri Lanka\u2019s leaders must answer if the premium for economic growth via a \u2018gift\u2019 is more valuable than protecting Sri Lanka\u2019s Land Rights &amp; Human Rights?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Shenali D Waduge<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The MCC is not just any ordinary agreement. It is an agreement that is signed between 2 Governments, passing 10 land registries to a newly created company called MCC Sri Lanka Pvt Ltd. So a government to government agreement creates a company to which funding is to be disbursed and this company whose aims &amp; [&hellip;]<\/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-98538","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\/98538","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=98538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98538\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}