Six lords and a lady to deliver nation from darkness to light

This week the spotlight will turn from the Diyawanna Lake’s Parliament to Hulftsdorp Hill’s Supreme Court as six lordships and one ladyship take their seats on the apex bench this Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to hear submissions made as to the legality or illegality of President Sirisena’s gazette fiat in dissolving Parliament before its shelf date.

The judges will be Chief Justice Nalin Perera, Justices Buwaneka Aluwihare, Sisira J. de Abrew, Priyantha Jayawardena, Prasanna S. Jayawardena, Vijith K. Malalgoda and Murdu Fernando. The judgment is expected to be given on Friday the seventh.

Of course, a three-bench court comprising of the Chief Justice Nalin Perera, Priyantha Jayawardena and Prasanna Jayawardena have already issued a stay order on the presidential gazette notification dissolving Parliament which enabled the House to open its doors for business as usual these last three turbulent weeks. But now after witnessing its impotence to render unto the people the sovereign coin that belongs to the people, the hopes of the nation have fled from that once august chamber and have sought ultimate refuge atop Hulftsdorp Hill, seeking justice so long denied.

Upon these honourable and learned personages who will grace the supreme bench this week to pass judgment on what is, probably, the gravest constitutional crisis the country has ever wit- nessed since the grant of independence, will rest the nation’s future fate.

In their hands they will hold the providence not in the fall of a single sparrow but in the rise or doom of an entire populace and their way of democratic life, of law and order, of the triumph of truth and justice over institutionalised lies and deception.

And in the people’s thoughts and prayers will be this fervent plea: Lead us, ye honourables, we the les miserables, from despair to hope, from darkness to light.