Can The Legislature Declare All Automobiles To Be Rickshaws?
Basil Fernando
The answer to that question is if the legislature can do whatever it likes, as it is becoming fashionable for some in Sri Lanka to say, it can also make such a declaration. The leader of the party that has the majority in parliament (even better if there is a two thirds majority), can order that his party members should vote to that effect and thus ensure that it will become the law.
The impact of the legislature making such a declaration can be twofold. It may merely be a name change. The automobiles will thereafter be called rickshaws. However, if besides a mere name change the legislature goes on to further stipulate that all the engines should be removed from automobiles and that, like rickshaws, they should be pulled by their operators, this would of course mean quite a radical change. If the legislature goes further and prescribes sanctions for those who would not abide by this new legislation, that would result in quite a lot of people ending up in jail or paying fines.
At the moment the attack on the judiciary is made on this basis that the legislature can do whatever it likes. Thus, the legislature can take over the functions of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) and dictate what the JSC should or should not do. For example, it is the position of some ministers and spokesmen for the government that the secretary to the JSC should not have made a press release mentioning, among other things, the interference on the workings of the JSC and the independence the judiciary. They are also of the view that this particular secretary of the JSC should not have chosen for that post as, they claim, he is not senior enough to have been thus chosen. The government and the legislature have thus taken upon themselves the task of deciding who should hold which post in relation to the JSC and what is or is not appropriate for the JSC to do.
