President, officials urged

> His orders are illegal, says Sri Lanka’s speaker

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s speaker on Sunday accused President Maithripala Sirisena of usurping parliament and urged public servants to defy his “illegal orders”, as the president scrambled to defend his controversial sacking of the legislature.

Speaker Karu Jayasuriya said Sirisena’s actions over the past two weeks in sacking prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and dissolving parliament undermined the freedoms of the people.

“I call upon all public servants to refuse to execute any illegal orders they may receive, no matter from whom. We must all act with patriotism and independence to safeguard the future of democracy in our country.”

He urged public officials to uphold “the independence of the public service, police and the judiciary”.

Sirisena triggered an unprecedented constitutional crisis last month when he sacked Wickremesinghe and replaced him with former strongman Mahinda Rajapakse ( pix) before suspending parliament.

In his first address to the nation since the sacking of parliament, Sirisena defended his move, saying violent clashes among rival MPs could have led to “civil unrest” across the country if the legislature had met.

Sirisena said there were media reports that politicians would clash during a vote to decide between the two men claiming the premiership.

“If I allowed the parliament to meet on Nov 14, there would have been violence in the House and it could have spread to our villagers and towns,” Sirisena said in his televised address. “I acted to prevent civil unrest.” Sirisena’s rivals maintain that he had no constitutional power to sack the assembly until it completed four-and-a-half out of its five-year term that ends in August 2020.

Three political parties holding an absolute majority in parliament and an election commissioner, one of three officials tasked with conducting polls, yesterday asked the Supreme Court to declare the president’s actions illegal.

Commissioner Ratnajeevan Hoole was among 12 petitioners arguing that Sirisena had violated the constitution.

In the five-page petition, Hoole said Sirisena broke the law in calling the snap elections for Jan 5 after a string of unconstitutional moves since Oct 26 when he fired Wickremesinghe.

Wickremesinghe’s United National Party, the main opposition Tamil National Alliance (TNA) and the leftist People’s Liberation Front jointly filed the action.

TNA spokesman M. A. Sumanthiran said the Supreme Court agreed to take up the petitions immediately considering the importance of the issue. – AFP