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Govt. climbs down from decision to hold PC polls in June
The Government wants to review different election laws in the country in a move that will recede prospects of any early Provincial Council polls.
When Parliament meets on April 6, House Leader and Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena will introduce a motion for the appointment of a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) for this purpose. Such a PSC, comprising government and opposition members, will examine election laws relating to presidential, parliamentary, provincial council and local council elections.
The exercise, government officials said, would be long drawn out since the proposed PSC would have to focus on different sets of polls laws. In addition, they said, public representations also would have to be called.
On Thursday, Minister Gunawardena told a party leaders meeting, chaired by Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, of the government’s move to appoint a PSC.
The new move appears to be a climbdown from the Government’s earlier plan to hold PC elections, possibly by the third week of June. Towards this end, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa held talks with Election Commission members. He later announced the move at a March 3 meeting of former Provincial Council members and urged them to prepare for the polls. The matter also came up at last Monday’s meeting of the cabinet of ministers. The plans then were to move amendments to electoral laws governing PC polls.
This development comes after the UN Human Rights Council last Tuesday adopted a Resolution on Sri Lanka “promoting reconciliation, accountability and human rights.” Among other matters, it also calls for the conduct of PC elections.
This is besides India which has re-iterated its call for PC elections after the visit to Sri Lanka by its External Affairs Minister, Dr Subramanyam Jaishanker. Two more calls were made thereafter, one by Indra Mani Pandey, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva, and the mission’s third secretary, just ahead of the voting on the Sri Lanka resolution.