For too long now, elections in this country have been won by those who succeeded the most in fooling the masses. With a Presidential Election now at hand, there appears to be intense competition among political parties to prey on the people who, as history has shown, are remarkably easy to fool.
On Friday (19), President Ranil Wickremesinghe, who has mastered the art, made a pronouncement at a public event which the media in general considered as newsworthy. It was reported that the President had stated that ‘Sri Lanka was unique in maintaining democracy following universal suffrage and that he was dedicated to preserving this democratic tradition. He called on the public to therefore have no fear regarding the 22nd Amendment.’
The mere fact that such an assurance was warranted from the highest in the land pertaining to the conducting of a routine election must surely say something about the current status quo and the rapidly widening trust deficit which the President appears to be aware of. However, the height of irony is that the man who has indefinitely postponed two scheduled elections – the Local Government Polls and the Provincial Council Elections – on flimsy grounds and is now trying every trick to delay the conducting of the Presidential Election, goes on stage and says that Sri Lanka is unique in maintaining democracy following universal suffrage, which then becomes ‘news’.
The general apprehension regarding constitutional tinkering is not without justification for the simple reason that constitutional amendments in this country are generally carried out to suit the political requirements of the regime in office and not for the benefit of the nation. The comedy of errors surrounding the last five amendments from the 17th onwards, where the same Members of Parliament voted for completely opposite objectives concerning the same matter on five different occasions, is all the more reason for this trepidation.
The people are not unaware of the fact that the current governance set-up in the country is as anti-democratic as it can possibly get, with almost zero reflection of the democratic will of the people at every level of the governance structure and this status quo is only being tolerated in anticipation of the next election. While there is no elected representation at the grassroots level, with both the Local Government and Provincial Council Elections on hold, defying a Supreme Court order to conduct the elections, even parliamentary representation is as skewed as it can possibly get following the exit of the former President and the incumbent being completely rejected at the last poll.
Therefore, to claim that Sri Lanka is a functioning democracy when even the most fundamental pillar of that ideal is being openly violated is certainly cause for concern. While the contentious 22nd Amendment to the Constitution is now at the centre of yet another completely unnecessary crisis, it also portends the conducting of an unnecessary referendum, incurring an amount equal to the conducting of the delayed Local Government Polls, all for the purpose of ‘correcting’ an ‘oversight’ pertaining to the upper limit of the presidential term which the Supreme Court has already confirmed on three separate occasions as being redundant and having no bearing on the clearly specified five-year term of the presidency.
Considering the unnecessary confusion the issue has generated in a backdrop of the Election Commission taking its own cool time to announce a date for the Presidential Poll, which the commission has been empowered to do as of last Wednesday (17), the Justice Minister took a step in the right direction by instructing the Ministry Secretary to withhold gazetting the amendment until the conclusion of the Presidential Poll, which as per the law must be done by 17 October.
However, that directive now appears to have sparked off yet another crisis, with the President deciding to override the Minister and order the publication of the gazette proclaiming the 22nd Amendment. Whether the Minister will meekly accept the slap on his face is yet to be seen, but he has already washed his hands off the matter, claiming that the President will have to face the consequences of going through with the amendment.
Despite the President’s assurances that the Presidential Poll will be conducted on time, a matter that is wholly beyond his control and coming under the exclusive purview of the Election Commission, it has not served the purpose of allaying fears of the creation of a constitutional roadblock hampering the election, as the gazetting of the amendment will necessarily trigger a mandatory chain of events including its presentation in Parliament, provision of a mandatory period of two weeks for the public to consult the Supreme Court if required, and thereafter obtaining a two-thirds majority, followed by a referendum.
Given the tight schedule ahead, with the Presidential Poll having to be conducted between 17 September and 16 October, the window for a referendum is rather short and will be an unnecessary burden for both the people as well as the exchequer, with the election cost likely to double. The President’s justification for rushing through this amendment at the 11th hour is that it was an oversight which escaped his attention when moving the 19th Amendment back in 2015 when he was Prime Minister.
However, this contention has since been dismissed by the legal luminary entrusted with drafting the 19th Amendment, President’s Counsel Jayampathy Wickramaratne, who last morning (20) publicly rebuked the President’s claim of an oversight. According to Wickramaratne, then President Maithripala Sirisena in concurrence with then Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had purposely omitted Clause 83(b) from the 19th Amendment as including that would have required a referendum. With this revelation literally coming from the horse’s mouth, the President will be hard put to justify not only his version of events leading to the ‘oversight,’ but also the necessity to rush through with it at this juncture.
Meanwhile, an influential legal advocacy group, the Lawyers’ Collective, of which Wickramaratne is a member, has sounded the alarm that the 22nd Amendment could potentially be a ruse to derail the electoral process. Interestingly enough, while the President has consistently stated that the Presidential Election will be held on time, he has not ruled out the conducting of a referendum. Such a poll on the eve of a crucial Presidential Election will no doubt cause chaos and confusion. Whether that in fact is the prime motive is to be seen but given the immense gamble in overriding his own Cabinet Minister and preempting an in-house clash, the stakes seem to be high.
According to the Lawyers’ Collective, if the amendment is passed with a two-thirds majority in Parliament, the President will be obligated to direct the Election Commission to conduct a referendum within 30 days of its passage in Parliament. In the alternative, if the amendment does not receive the required two-thirds approval in Parliament, then the President may use that as an excuse to dissolve Parliament, with ruling party support already on the wane with an increasing number of ruling party MPs deciding to go ‘independent’. In such an eventuality, a General Election will likely take the place of a referendum. Therefore, either way, it is increasingly likely that two elections will have to be held before 17 October.
Reverting to the 22nd Amendment, it is difficult to comprehend the reason to bust Rs. 10 billion – the cost of conducting a national poll, according to estimates of the Election Commission – and bring the nation to a grinding halt for a couple of days as people travel to their villages to vote, simply to correct an ‘oversight’ that has had no bearing on the last Presidential Election nor will on any future elections as already clarified by the apex court. Therefore, as to what exactly is on the President’s mind in taking the plunge with this latest gambit will likely be seen sooner than later given the tight timeline ahead. Interesting times ahead, for sure.