Lessons From A Working Democracy To Sri Lanka
By Nagananda Kodituwakku -November 3, 2013 |
Nagananda Kodituwakku
The Accountability
In the UK, Prime Minister, is the head of the Executive, leads the government with the support of the Cabinet of ministers and they all are collectively and severally responsible for their actions, successes and failures to the people who elected them to public office.
In Sri Lanka the President, the head of the Executive, effectively control the legislature and also the Judiciary. The President is absolutely immune from any legal proceedings and no proceedings shall be instituted or continued against the President in any Court or tribunal in respect of anything done or omitted by the President either in official or private capacity.
With these entrench provisions there is no democracy in Sri Lanka but it is just a farce and unworkable in this island nation.
What measures and when such measures would be taken to restore true democracy working in Sri Lanka, with the abolition of those provisions that gives the president a total immunity?
Appointment and removal of Judges
In the UK the Judicial Appointments Commission, a non-departmental public body, is responsible for selecting judge. Candidates are required to submit a nine-page application form, and they are shortlisted and interviewed by the Commission. All candidates were to be judged on merit alone, measured by five core qualities: intellectual capacity; personal qualities (integrity, independence, judgment, decisiveness, objectivity, ability; willingness to learn); ability to understand and deal fairly; authority and communication skills; and efficiency to ensuring a judiciary of the highest calibre, with candidates drawn from the full range of available talent.
In Sri Lanka, all Judicial appointments including the appointment of Chief Justice, the other judges of the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeal is solely in the hands of the Executive President whose decision making cannot be challenged in any Court of Law.
Sri Lanka claims that it is a democracy but with no separation of power and independence of judiciary.
Give a guarantee to your own people that you would restore the rule of law and independence of Judiciary within a specific time frame?
