The next frontier in constitutional voyage
-ksn.jpg)
by Rajan Philips-December 19, 2015
Time will tell if Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s Sujata Jayawardena Memorial Lecture, on December 11, 2015, will become a historical companion to JR Jayewardene’s December 1966 address to the Ceylon Association for the Advancement of Science (CAAS, now SLAAS), and Dr. Colvin R de Silva’s December 1969 talk to the Socialist Study Circle. Those familiar with Sri Lanka’s seemingly never ending constitutional voyage will know that it was at the CAAS, in 1966, JRJ first made the proposition for a presidential system of government. Three years later, at the Socialist Study Circle, Colvin R de Silva outlined the method and the makeup of the first Republican Constitution. Now 50 years on, Ranil Wickremesinghe has announced another constitutional makeover, purportedly to implement devolution of power, introduce a new electoral process, and find, as the Prime Minister put it, "an alternative to the executive presidential system".