Editorial

What President Maithripala Sirisena was thinking when he embarked upon his extra-constitutional misadventures seven weeks ago is anybody’s guess. That it would draw to this ignominious end as far as he was concerned with his actions being called to question in the apex court of the land was much less uncertain.

A man who crowed that he had voluntarily curtailed the powers of his office should have known better than to put his own assertions to the test unless absolutely certain he had been wrong in the first instant. Mr Sirisena had once unequivocally pronounced that, after the passage of the 19th Amendment, the President could not dissolve Parliament until four-and-a-half years was up.

The problem with everything that played out since October 26 was that one could never be sure what new delusion the President was labouring under. He allowed himself to be guided by whatever fantastical and, frankly, beggarly interpretations of the Constitution his coterie of advisers drip-fed him.

And look where it got him. Mr Sirisena will occupy a space in history as a President who wilfully violated the country’s constitution, and repeatedly. He is now impeachable. And when he swears in Ranil Wickremesinghe as Prime Minister once again this morning, he has to eat his own words and swallow his pride, with the full enormity of his failed experiment hitting home.

We are talking about two months of futile machinations interspersed with self-aggrandising public statements claiming that he, the President, was motivated by a genuine desire to protect the nation from vaguely-defined threats. He talked of an assassination attempt, of which we have yet to hear something substantial. It soon became clear that the real reason was a personality clash with his Prime Minister—not uncommon in mismatching coalitions and cohabitation governments—which he feared had rendered him politically impotent.

But the constitution, naturally, makes no provision for personality clashes. So various other premises were floated (after each fact) to justify what, in effect, was a gross abuse of power and Presidential position. One man’s complex destabilised an entire nation of 22 million people and brought public administration to its proverbial knees.

There is still no budget for the next financial year, credit ratings have slipped, foreign capital has flown the stock market (although that discharge started earlier this year) and lending is on hold till a Government is in place. Since December 4, the country has had no administration, no proper Prime Minister and no one to turn to, but the Supreme Court, since the writ of Parliament was being held in utter contempt by the President and his appointed Prime Minister no less, and their backers. The Speaker was unfairly vilified and the Legislature brought to the level of a Billingsgate.

On Thursday, the apex court delivered. Asked to delve into whether the dissolution of Parliament had violated the fundamental rights of multiple petitioners, the seven-judge-bench unanimously held in the affirmative. The stinging ruling, amply citing case law, dismissed key arguments made in the public domain by legal pundits in academia and more self-proclaimed practitioners as well who try to argue black is white with disastrous consequences to the non-legal minded leaders of theirs.

Sri Lankan law does not recognise that any public authority, whether it be the President or an officer of the State or an organ of the State, has unfettered or absolute discretion or power, said the decision authored by Chief Justice Nalin Perera. The President is subject to the Constitution and the law, and must act within the terms of both. That is the Basic Law and that is basic common sense.

This, of course, was a foregone conclusion. That the Sirisena-Rajapaksa camp even attempted to circumvent inviolable provisions as well as cardinal principles, spirit and provisions of the foremost law of the land gives a hint to the type of administration they might have run, had their reckless plot succeeded.

There is a silver lining—and that is that the scheme did not succeed. The system fought back, and how! One arm of the State may have gone rogue. But the other two prevailed as proof of how robustly Sri Lankan institutions, if left unfettered, will perform in the face of adversity. Out of all this mud, a lotus has emerged, unfortunately not the symbol of the party that was party to the constitutional coup.

In Parliament, disparate political groups fell behind motions brought forward to establish that Mr Rajapaksa and his “administration” did not command a majority in the House. While the independence of the Supreme Court bench was questioned and discounted by some commentators, the upright judges delivered a unanimous decision upholding the rights of the citizenry. It was also a message to detractors overseas, governments, NGOs and diaspora lobbies which have been mouthing platitudes on the question of the independence of the judiciary of Sri Lanka.

If Mr Sirisena proved just how far an individual would go to abuse the powers—including, ironically, authority he did not hold—of the Executive Presidency, the system showed just how well-geared it was to quell it. Peacefully and with the dignity and decorum that again and again, had failed to be displayed in Parliament.

It was clear that, had they been allowed to entrench themselves, the new dispensation that President Sirisena foisted upon the nation would again have set about weakening, if not dismantling, the checks and balances that are so vital to democracy. Early incidents of ‘take-overs’ of state media; violence at the Petroleum Corporation; the Finance Minister giving letters to allow foreigners take away foreign currency against Customs regulations; a shady multimillion dollar LNG deal fast tracked through the Cabinet; a young MP sauntering into the Financial Crimes Investigation Division in gym gear displayed disdain to the principles of good governance in that short period in ‘office’.

In the meantime, it is vital that the events of October 26 be viewed and examined in their right perspective. This was not a noble endeavour to salvage the nation from destruction. This was a poorly disguised power grab, carried out on the most outrageous political and legal advice by a group of conspirators gambling heavily that the citizenry will meekly fall in line.

What will happen now remains to be seen. It is anticipated that, with Mr Wickremesinghe taking oaths afresh today, a new Cabinet will be installed. But the jaundiced dynamics between him and the petulant Head of Government, who is also head of State, could make it difficult, if not impossible to do any meaningful governance in the months to come. Both seem to wear separate crowns of thorns. Let us hope for a new beginning. If the President could have made-up with his bete noire of yesteryear and made him his Prime Minister, there’s no reason he cannot emulate the feat with Mr. Wickremesinghe. And you cannot shake hands with one hand either.