Power separation in 19A has created constitutional crisis: Dayasiri

The 19th Amendment has given different overlapping responsibilities to the President and Prime Minister on the appointment of the Cabinet which is extremely confusing and arguable

The power separation under the 19th Amendment has generated a major constitutional crisis by creating a powerful Prime Minister while clipping the powers of the Executive President, General Secretary of the SLFP, Dayasiri Jayasekara said and he added that to eliminate this constitutional mismatch, the 20th Amendment was sine qua non.

Mr. Jayasekara in a lighter vein said, “Governance is supposed to be like a bicycle ridden with the President on the seat and the Prime Minister on the bar.“but sadly, what has happened today is that the Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe is riding the bicycle with the President sitting on the bar. If this is not enough, the chain of the bicycle snaps more often than not,” he quipped.

Addressing the weekly SLFP news briefing at the party office yesterday, Mr. Jayasekara said there are several clauses and paragraphs in the 19th Amendment that give different interpretations making it extremely confusing and controversial.

For instance, clause 1 of Paragraph 43 says that the Prime Minister shall determine the number of Ministers of the Cabinet of Ministers, and the Ministries and the assignment of subjects and functions to such Ministers.

In clause 2, it says the President shall, on the advice of the Prime Minister, appoint from among Members of Parliament, Ministers to be in charge of the Ministries so determined. And again in clause 3 of Paragraph 43, it says that the Prime Minister may at any time change the assignment of subjects and functions and recommend to the President changes in the composition of the Cabinet of Ministers. Such changes shall not affect the continuity of the Cabinet of Ministers and the continuity of its responsibility to Parliament.

“The 19th Amendment has given different overlapping responsibilities to the President and Prime Minister on the appointment of the Cabinet which is extremely confusing and arguable. The 19th Amendment’s restriction of the tenure of office of the President to 5 years from six years, the power to dissolve Parliament only after four and half years have lapsed, the establishment of the Constitutional Council (CC), Independent Commissions and appointment of judges to the apex courts are also highly controversial and disputable. That is why some say today that there are no independent commissions or an independent judiciary today in Sri Lanka”, Mr. Jayasekara stressed.

Another controversy under the 19th Amendment is how long the tenure of office of President Sirisena lasts. Normally, an Act is enacted after the Speaker put his signature to it after its passage in Parliament. If that is the case, the five year term of President Sirisena has to be counted from May 21, 2015, the date on which Speaker Jayasuriya signed it. But his tenure has been deemed to have started from January 9, 2015, the day he took oaths before the Chief Justice.

President Sirisena took over the Presidency in January 2015 after being voted in by 6.2 million people with the hope that he would be the Executive President for six years. However, the 19th Amendment has restricted it to five years which is a violation of democracy and denies the aspirations of the people. These provisions are also debatable, Mr. Jayasekara charged.

“Certain clauses and paragraphs have been sneaked into the 19th Amendment by the government by hoodwinking the President, MPS and the public with the aim of strengthening the hand of the Prime Minister and clipping the President’s powers.