Sri Lanka president Gotabhaya Rajapakse's newly formed government is rushing with its plans to amend the constitution of the island nation in a measure to consolidate further dictatorial powers of the president. A draft twentieth amendment (20A) to abolish the last amendment to the Constitution was approved by the cabinet of ministers yesterday. Government sources say the amendment will be soon gazetted and then presented to parliament within next two weeks. Country's attorney general has advised the secretary to the ministry of justice that the bill requires no referendum, but could be enacted with a two-thirds majority, which the government has almost secured in the August 5 general election.
Rajapakse's SLPP campaigned for a long time for the abrogation of the nineteenth amendment (19A), which they claimed has curtailed considerable powers of the executive presidency. Rajapakse's Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna(SLPP) chairman and Minister of Education, G.L.Peiris stated last week that 19A hampered "smooth functioning of the government". Cynically, Peiris's reference to blocking 'smooth functioning' is an outcry against the limited restrictions the amendment has imposed upon Rajapakse regime's authoritarian rule.
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| The new Cabinet |
Rajapakse used his constitutional powers to dissolve the then parliament on 2 March, six months before the schedule, and called for a two-thirds parliamentary majority, in order to change the constitution and strengthen presidential executive powers. Campaigning against 19A, he claimed that the current presidential powers were “adverse to the country’s stability” and that he could not “fulfil the people’s expectations” without expanded powers.(Link: Sri Lankan president dissolves parliament, calls national election, wsws.org, 06.03.2020)
The present constitution of the country was first introduced in 1978 by the then United National Party (UNP) president J.R.Jayawardene's right-wing government, granting the president enormous powers as the head of the state, government and the military and exclusive powers to appoint almost all heads of state institutions including the Prime Minister and the Chief Justice. Later, the Constitutional Council mechanism introduced by the seventeenth amendment imposed some fetters upon powers of the president to appoint members to independent commissions.
Back then, voted for by almost all members of parliament who are now vociferous against the same, 19A was brought in by the ousted pro-US Sirisena-Wickremasinghe government - which came to power in 2015 with the soon abandoned promise of abolishing executive presidency - to reverse instead the changes made by the eighteenth amendment (18A) to the Constitution. The latter was a notorious piece of legislation that was engineered in a similar bid to consolidate dictatorial rule of the then regime of former president Mahinda Rajapaksha, who is current president's elder brother and now the prime minister of his government.
The 19A, among other things, re-established the Constitutional Council which deprived the presidential powers to remove persons appointed by him under the recommendation of the Council to several 'independent' commissions; limited the number of terms a person could be elected as president to two; removed president's powers to dissolve parliament just after one sixth of its term; offered prime minister powers of advising the president to appoint ministers; erased the powers of president to remove prime minister at his will; and significantly, deprived the president from holding any ministerial portfolios.
Reportedly, the 20A will repeal all provisions in 19A except those relating to the term limit and duration of the president, the term limit of parliament and the clauses for recognition of the fundamental right to information. The president's power to hold ministries, especially the ministry of defence, will be restored. It will also enable the government to pass what Peiris referred to as emergency bills, an often abused escape route to avoid pre-enactment challenges through country's apex court of bills certified by secretary to the cabinet as urgent; and abolish Constitutional Council, which will empower president to appoint and remove commissioners at his will. In a nutshell, any previous limitation to the executive power of the president would be lifted.
Peiris stated this would be the final amendment to the present constitution, confirming Rajapakshe's recent policy statement to the new parliament that his Sinhala-supremacist majoritarian government is still more inclined in bringing in a new communal constitution with almost unlimited dictatorial powers vested with the president and in detriment to the rights of the country's Tamill and Muslim communities.
The new government will be the most right wing in Sri Lankan history, as the Rajapakse regime prepares an all-out offensive against social and democratic rights of the working people. Since his appointment as president last November, Rajapakse, who himself is a former army officer, has been increasingly basing his regime on the military, appointing in-service and retired senior military officers to top positions of the government. He capitalized the COVID-19 pandemic to strengthen militarization of the capital Colombo,the North-East and rest of the country.
Confronted by economic crisis and resulting social unrest - which led to the defeat of UNP both during presidential and parliamentary elections - the ruling class was fanning the slogan of 'strong leadership' to uplift itself out of the crisis. Rajapakse, their chosen one, has since then declared outright 'economic war' against the working class and been building a presidential dictatorship, while openly flouting the constitution and the law. Notwithstanding the constitutional prohibition, he has now appointed himself the minister of defence, which ministry has 23 key institutions within its purview. Chamal Rajapakse, president's eldest brother holds the state ministry of internal security and home affairs, which controls police and central administrative branches.
It is no surprise that almost all the establishment parties - the UNP, Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), Tamil National Alliance (TNA), Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP)
and Muslim parties - and trade unions would support the proposed amendment, either expressly or indirectly. The pandemic has aggravated political and social tensions and all of them have offered to save the capitalist class rule against a militant working class which will rise against the government's severe austerity measures and its backing of US's imperialist war preparations, sooner rather than later. The masses have already shown their disgust against these parties, which have been backing Rajapaksha's increased militarization in the name of combating the pandemic.
In a goodwill gesture of their support for Rajapakse regime’s anti-democratic agenda, the parliamentary opposition parties allowed the president’s policy statement to be passed without a vote.
The main opposition party, SJP has moved to express its opposition to the amendment only as a tactical maneuver. It backed Rajapakse's increasing militarization and attacks against democratic rights in the pretext of supporting government's effort to fight the pandemic.
JVP leader Vijitha Herath told DailyFT, that "we will put aside political differences and fight together" against moves to abolish 19A. Herath is declaring its readiness to work with right-wing political parties, mainly the SJB. After giving all backing for Rajapakse's military deployment in pandemic prevention, JVP's posture as defenders of democratic rights is a facade.
A more pernicious role is played by the pseudo-left formations. Pubudu Jayagoda, the education secretary of the Frontline Socialist Party (FSP) told "Divaina", a Sinhalese daily, last week, that it has no objection for the proposed constitutional amendment, but that his party is waiting to determine their political programme till the 20A is drafted. This is a display of sheer opportunism. Showing FSP's callous attitude towards the impending dangers, Jayagoda stated "the 19A is brought forward to suppress the real problems" and asks,"is it a power sharing arrangement between the two brothers?"
Just after the general election, FSP declared their readiness to work with "left, petty-bourgeois and progressive sections of the right-wing parties… on common issues.”
FSP is fundamentally hostile to any independent mobilization of the working class against the bourgeois rule and has been fixing deadly political traps against the working people, since its nominal break away from the JVP in 2012. It was instrumental in ushering into power of the Sirisena-Wickremasinghe government in 2015 and legitimizing Sajith Premadasa's as UNP's candidate in last November presidential election as "lesser evil". FSP is therefore politically responsible for the institution of Rajapakse's autocratic regime. (Link: Sri Lanka’s pseudo-left FSP and its phony defence of democracy, 14.05.2020)
While Rajapakse's preparations for consolidation of autocratic rule is parallel to his international counterparts, these developments are stark warning to the working class. The working people of the country should oppose these preparations and come forward to defend democratic rights and better living and working conditions on the perspective of international socialism.
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After the Sri Lankan election, president moves towards dictatorial rule, wsws.org, 25.08.2020.
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