Hands off states’ internal affairs, President tells the United Nations
20A tabled in House: 18 petitions before Supreme Court as SJB asks 20A to be placed before people at referendum
As the United Nations began celebrating its 75th anniversary beneath a pall of COVID restrictions, and asked member states to answer the theme question ‘What We Need of the United Nations,’ Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s pithy reply was: ‘ We expect the United Nation will place due emphasis on non- interference in domestic affairs of other states.’
In a pre- recorded statement delivered via video conferencing to the High- Level Meeting to mark the 75th Anniversary Summit of the United Nations on Monday, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa said, ‘At a time when the world is facing a common and an unrivalled threat, the “United Nations We Need”, I am certain, will place due emphasis on the sovereign equality of States, respect for territorial integrity and non-interference in their domestic affairs”.
The President said he firmly believes that partnerships fostered between Member States and the UN continues at their best when no country is held hostage to the interests of a few.
‘Non-interference in the domestic affairs of other states?’ Haven’t heard that one for some time?
It has, indeed, taken a long, long time for that line to escape the lips of a Sri Lankan President or Government. During the Tiger terrorist war years and at its climactic heights when the United Nations started to express untoward concern, the constant refrain of Sri Lanka has been to tell the UN or any other nation, especially, India, that dared to meddle in her affairs where to get off the bus and to keep its hands off Lanka.
It was then, of course, the fashionable age old ideology that what a nation did with her own people was her sole affair and it was none of anyone else’s business to poke their noses into it, based on the then sacrosanct concept of the sovereignty of nations, including the right of governments to butcher its own people if it felt so inclined.
But much water has flowed under the bridge since then that it has eroded this once inviolate concept, and today the international community has realised that it can no longer look askance when Governments of member states, even democratically elected ones, take cover behind this once impenetrable shield of sovereignty to supress the internationally recognised fundamental rights of humanity. These rights are not indigenous to a certain area but are transcendent, they are rights without borders. Inviolate rights which, if infringed, give the international community the right to lift the veil of sovereignty and act, if need be by force.
It is the mandate the United Nations Commission of Human
Rights has to probe instances where rights have been violated; and, in certain cases, even before they are violated.
For instance, when the Government gazetted the 20 Amendment Draft to the Constitution, there were not only shrieks of protests made locally at the prospect of the executive presidency being strengthened to an unwar ranted extent and Parliament reduced to a presidential play thing which could be dissolved in toto at presidential whim the moment it ceased to amuse, the UNHRC issued a statement decrying the draft amendment.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, said the proposed 20th Amendment may negatively impact the independence of key institutions, including the Nat i o n a l H u m a n R i g h t s Commission. She was troubled that the new Government of Sri Lanka is swiftly reneging on its commitments to the Human Rights Council since it withdrew its support for resolution 30/1.
“The surveillance and intimidation of victims, their families, human rights defenders, journalists and lawyers should cease immediately. I encourage the Council to give renewed attention to Sri Lanka, in view of the need to prevent threats to peace, reconciliation and sustainable development,” she said on Monday 14 September.
These comments were given short shrift by the Lankan Government on September 15. Though it fell short of telling off the UNHRC Chief to mind her own business and state not to interfere in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation, Lanka’s Acting Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva, Dayani Mendis, said the comments made by the UN High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet on the proposed 20th Amendment are unwarranted and pre- judgemental, based on presumption. The draft 20A submitted through Parliament will be discussed, debated, following a complete democratic process.
After this brief standoff with the UN Human Rights Council, Sri Lanka formerly put the entire United Nations on notice a week later on Monday the 21st, not to interfere in her internal affairs and planted the signboard firmly on the land stating, ‘ Do Not Trespass’. This was done at the UN’s 75 years Anniversary Summit for the whole world to take note of and avoid stepping on the grass.
The day f o l l owing the President’s address to the UN not to mess around with Lanka’s domestic affairs and encroach on her sovereignty, the Government tabled the 20th Amendment Draft Bill in Parliament as scheduled. It was as it had been gazetted. The Original Monty without a comma or a colon changed. Any changes to the controversial bill will be considered at the committee stage, the Government had declared.
The bill was presented to Parliament amidst uproar. And though the election had decimated the opposition, the din of protest that swelled from its eunuchised ranks was not muted nor diminished. The opposition’s disquiet over the vista the 20 Amendment Draft Bill had in store for both Parliament and nation if enacted, found voice vibrant enough to resound throughout the chamber and passionate enough to quell its defenders.
By Friday afternoon, 18 petitions challenging the bill were filed in the Supreme Court. The hearings are expected to begin on Tuesday and are estimated to last 3 weeks. Among the petitioners is the main opposition party, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya.
The SJB petition states that the proposed 20th Amendment is inconsistent with the Constitution and that it requires not only a twothirds majority in Parliament but approval by the people at a referendum for it to be enacted.
In its petition, the SJB claims that the 20 amendment violates people’s sovereignty and franchise enshrined in Article (3) and (4) of the Constitution; is inconsistent with the public trust doctrine and the principle of checks and balances and would prejudicially affect public finance;. seeks to repeal Article 156A of the Constitution, which provides constitutional recognition to the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption; seeks to repeal the prohibition on dual citizens being elected to Parliament and to the post of President; seeks to curtail the power of the Auditor General to audit state institutions seeks to make an omission by the President no longer challengeable in the Supreme Court through a fundamental rights violation petition; seeks to further enhance the powers of the President by allowing him to unilaterally remove the Prime Minister and to make the President not accountable to Parliament; seeks to enable the President to dissolve Parliament after a general election
Thus, as things stand today, it will lie in the hands of a Supreme Court bench of Judges to decide whether a government with a twothirds majority can steamroll its way through the House to make the proposed amendment law or whether the right to sanction such a radical change will be returned to the people to decide through a referendum what form of government they deserve to receive and live under.
It has, indeed, taken a long, long time for that line to escape the lips of a Sri Lankan President or Government. During the Tiger terrorist war years and at its climactic heights when the United Nations started to express untoward concern, the constant refrain of Sri Lanka has been to tell the UN or any other nation, especially, India, that dared to meddle in her affairs where to get off the bus and to keep its hands off Lanka.