Court dismisses Chandrika’s plea to put off election
By Our Correspondent
COLOMBO, Aug 26: Sri Lanka’s supreme court on Friday ruled that a presidential election was due this year, setting the stage for a vote before Nov 22. The ruling came on a reference filed by the Jathika Hela Urumaya, an all-monk party which had asked the court to determine whether President Chandrika Kumaratunga’s second six-year term ends this year or next year.
The controversy arose because Ms Kumaratunga, who was elected to her first six-year term in 1994, called early election in 1999 and won. But her lawyers argued before the court that her second six-year term began in 2000, and not in 1999.
The lawyers claimed the president was entitled to stay in office for 12 years (starting in 1994), arguing that it was immaterial when the election that gave her a second term was held.
But the supreme court thought otherwise.
“According to the constitution, and the interpretations heard earlier... I hold the president’s second term in office commenced on Dec 22, 1999, and will end six years from that date,” Chief Justice Sarath Silva said.
Agencies add: Election Commissioner Dayananda Dissanayake said after the judgment an election would be held this year.
“It is dead sure that it is this year,” Mr Dissanayake said. “It must be between Oct 21 and Nov 21,” he added, saying he would fix the definitive date next week.
Sri Lanka’s leading share index soared on the news, rising 1.56 per cent to a new life closing high, while President Kumaratunga’s opponents lit firecrackers outside the courthouse and across Colombo.
“All attempts by the executive president to hang onto power have been defeated,” said Buddhist monk and MP Venerable Athuraliye Rathana Thero, parliamentary group leader for the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), which filed the fundamental rights application.
Ms Kumaratunga’s office had no immediate comment.
GOVT ACCEPTS RULING: But government spokesman Nimal Siripala de Silva made a brief statement in parliament as MPs cheered Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and his predecessor, United National Party leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, who will now go head-to-head for the presidency.
“We respect the Supreme Court’s judgment,” de Silva said.
Sri Lanka’s main parties — including Ms Kumaratunga’s — had hedged their bets and were already in full campaign mode before the ruling. Billboards on roads from Colombo to the ancient hill capital of Kandy are pasted with party slogans and candidates’ pictures.
“This country needs peace ... but for me the number one priority is unemployment,” Premier Rajapakse said at his first campaign rally in the island’s southern district of Matara.
The election will be the fifth poll since Ms Kumaratunga’s re-election in 1999 — general elections were held in 2000, 2001 and 2004 — and analysts say another general election could soon be in the offing.
“At least it has put an end to confusion that has existed for the past several months,” said Jayadeva Uyangoda, head of political science at Colombo University.
But with the government already in its worst crisis with the Tamil Tigers since a 2002 truce halted two decades of civil war, and tens of thousands of tsunami survivors at the mercy of the state bureaucracy, the man on the street is asking: Why?
“These people are crazy. How can we have an election every year like this? How can the economy cope with such a massive expenditure?” said 33-year-old Sunimal Gomes, tending his vegetable stall.
Sri Lanka’s financial markets and businesses have voiced widespread frustration with the slow pace of economic reform by Ms Kumaratunga’s ruling coalition, which is struggling to govern after its hardline Marxist ally pulled out over plans to share tsunami aid with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
“What is important from an investment angle is to look at the continuation of the peace process and further strengthening of it,” said Hasitha Premaratne, head of research at HNB Stockbrokers in Colombo.
The government’s ties with the Tigers are at their lowest ebb since the ceasefire after a silent war that both sides blame on the other culminated in the assassination of the island’s foreign minister this month.
Political uncertainty is deterring real investment in the $20 billion economy, but the Colombo bourse is unfazed, up over 40 per cent so far this year as high local inflation relative to interest rates discourages investment in fixed-term assets.
It promises to be a close presidential race, and observers say Mr Rajapakse will likely need to woo the Marxists back on side to beat Mr Wickremesinghe.
