Judiciary stamps on presidential excesses

Environment experts said recently that Sri Lanka is the second most vulnerable country to global climate change. In another 50 to 100 years Sri Lanka will probably be uninhabitable chiefly because of man’s own follies.

Why wait fifty years or more to see this land like no other being destroyed when the country’s own politicians are already doing so with such finesse. Those who came to power promising the people that after one term in office they will pack their ‘ hamas petti’ and retire to their neck of the woods already mostly ruined by those who fell the trees and clear the jungles, now want to hang around for another term.

So, long before climate change can ruin the nation, there are politicians furiously at work tearing away at Sri Lanka’s social and political fabric as though time is running out on them.

If President Sirisena is anxious that his name will not be recorded in history, he need not worry. His name will certainly be there but not writ in golden letters. Sri Lanka will never forget his name. How can it when he is the first in our 2,500-year history to head a nation with no government. How can he be forgotten when he continues to deny the person, who was legally the prime minister, the right to return to his position and restore the government Sirisena dismissed in a moment of capriciousness and infamy.

Oh, no. History will not forget President Maithripala Sirisena who increasingly thought of himself as king and not a servant of the people which he said he would be when elected as president. Maithripala Sirisena became president by an accident of history, if the truth is to be recorded.

For the last seven weeks or more, the people of Sri Lanka-- and indeed the world outside--have witnessed the tragic-comedy enacted by our head of state and a circle of his advisers and friends who have led the man up the garden path and into the hands of the judiciary. Would it be useful to know who his legal advisers were? At least then we could avoid them.

So the crass conduct and actions of the head of the Sri Lankan state brought him into conflict with the highest court of law which unanimously held that even the rulers must obey the supreme law of the country and there is no escape from it.

But there were those who sought to demolish the third arm of the state--the legislature--with their physical threats, thuggish behaviour and their criminal acts, expecting to subdue and subvert the country’s parliament.

Thankfully, modern technology makes it easier now to capture scenes on digital camera. That is how the country was able to see on screen MPs dressed in business suits lifting chairs to throw at the Speaker or other elected representatives. Those who have committed themselves to a code of conduct for parlia- mentarians seem to think nothing of wrecking their own codes.

This is the kind of person who propels himself to the front as an elected representative of the people when they should be shut out of civilized society.

Fortunately, for the country, there are still institutions that refuse to be overawed by thugs in business suits and so the legislature and the judiciary continued to perform the tasks they are mandated to do.

There is one more hearing before the Supreme Court and when that determination is announced the Sri Lankan people will know where they stand and how the government which they do not have at this writing, will conduct itself.

A few days ago, a Supreme Court decision annulled President Sirisena’s proclamation dissolving parliament and announcing the date for a snap parliamentary election and settled that particular issue.

It was a clear slap to the face of the black coated fraternity who obviously advised Sirisena that he had the power to constitutionally dissolve parliament when he thought it fit to do so.

But there are other matters that need to be resolved. For instance, the verdict on the Quo Warranto petition presented by more than half the numbers in parliament that questioned the right of Mahinda Rajapaksa to be prime minister and others who had been appointed as cabinet ministers.

The three- member Supreme Court bench determined not to continue with the interim order of the Court of Appeal that stayed Rajapaksa and cabinet ministers from functioning as lawfully elected officials – or were they the result of presidential pique that saw the previous prime minister and his cabinet removed in a fit of personal animosity?

This is precisely where the problem lies. It goes to the heart of the matter of political cohabitation which started smoothly after Sirisena became president but steadily deteriorated as days went by.

As this column has often pointed out one of the issues that surfaced as the Government of National Unity settled down was that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had surrounded himself with former school mates and friends who found themselves comfortably ensconced in positions of power and influence.

This column used to refer to them as the Racecourse Avenue cabal. They acted in a manner that conveyed the impression that they were a protected lot.

In doing so, they seemed to either ignore President Sirisena who was the head of the cabinet or belittle him as an unsophisticated local yokel who did not comprehend the intricacies of modern economics and global developments.

That may be partly true, of course. But still as head of state and government, he deserved respect which some tended to show publicly but privately denigrated. In Colombo’s cocktail circuit, Sirisena was talked of as village bumpkin.

It was this mix of growing personal animosity and ideological differences

As this column has often pointed out one of the issues that surfaced as the Government of National Unity settled down was that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had surrounded himself with former school mates and friends who found themselves comfortably ensconced in positions of power and influence. This column used to refer to them as the Racecourse Avenue cabal. They acted in a manner that conveyed the impression they were a protected lot.

that gradually led to clashes in cabinet particularly between Sirisena and Wickremesinghe.

As days went by, Sirisena, who loved to travel the world at the drop of a diphthong, was becoming more irritable as personal relations between them turned nastier. By now Sirisena would publicly criticise the UNP and take pot shots at Wickremesinghe. Though the prime minister called on his party to doggedly soldier on despite the barbs aimed at them, the public was becoming increasingly aware it was not always possible to remain silent as innuendos and shots across the bows were fired from different directions.

There were other reasons why this marriage of convenience was heading for the rocks. For this, Sirisena was partly responsible with his futile attempts to win over members of the UNP and seek their support to back Sirisena as a common candidate at the next presidential election.

The problem with Maithripala Sirisena was, and is, that he thrashes out left and right often at public events in condemnation of those in the coalition government who are from a different party.

He has a tendency to talk first and think later and so nothing is certain, a well-known Trumpian quality. Only the other day he said that Mahinda Rajapaksa could not muster a working majority in parliament because the purchase price of MPs had risen to above Rs 500 million.

This might well be true. But what he said was indeed an utter insult to all elected MPs. He was saying that MPs were open to bribery and that they could be bought and would readily cross over to the Rajapaksa camp if the price was right as though it was a cattle auction.

Sirisena was misled by those who tried to broker a deal to make Mahinda Rajapaksa prime minister. Those who carried tales to Sirisena that Rajapaksa had 113 MPs supporting him and so had a working majority are also to blame. Sirisena worked on this false information carried by those who wanted the Sirisena- Rajapaksa deal to go through even though there was no definitive evidence to justify the claim of 113 Rajapaksa supporters.

Now that the Court of Appeal interim order stands until the next hearing, Sri Lankans can heave a sigh of relief and enjoy the New Year.