Referendum? Question please
In the absence of any substantive information coming from the Government's otherwise relentless pursuit of peace with the Liberation Tigers (LTTE), a wayward remark from its chief negotiator calling for a 'Non-binding' Referendum on the peace process, has made news.

Straightaway, it has drawn criticism from the two extremes - the LTTE itself, and the parliamentary opposition indicating quite clearly the difficulty the Government has in treading the middle path.

On the face of it, consulting the people from time to time is a good thing. But consulting an un-informed people is an expensive exercise in futility. The people of this country simply do not know what's going on in the far-off capitals of the world. They are not that naive to swallow the official media leaks that groundbreaking negotiations are taking place.

The releases from the Royal Norwegian embassy playing the role of honest-broker, however much their credibility has been shattered, only aggravates the confusion.
So far the Government's chief negotiator's pronouncement does not seem to have the Government's imprimatur - and no one knows what the likely Question is going to be asked from the people.

Governments often believe that using the "Referendum' ploy could override what they believe to be the nagging irritant of adverse public opinion. When she was faced with the inevitable collapse of her regime in 2001, President Chandrika Kumaratunga reverted to this magic wand she thought will cure her of all her problems by wanting to put a new Constitution to the people at a referendum.

In a recent judgment, Justice Mark Fernando and the Supreme Court scrutinising the impugned Question at that ill-fated referendum, " Is a new Constitution as a matter of national importance and necessity needed for the country?", said that such a Question must be capable of being answered with a "Yes" or a "No".

The Supreme Court was of the view that both a 'yes' or a 'no' answer would lead to an ambiguous situation, with those answering 'yes' agreeable to a new Constitution, but holding divergent views as to what it should provide whilst those answering 'no' may be of the view that a new Constitution was not needed, merely amendments to the existing one, or a new Constitution was needed but was not of national importance necessarily or a new Constitution was not necessary at all.

All this, the Supreme Court held, was quite apart from the cost of a referendum which bore no clarity whatsoever. There is, in the meanwhile, a lot that is happening that is not being debated in the public domain. For instance, the entire issue of the High Security Zone in Jaffna which our Defence Correspondent has dealt with in the opposite page.
There are a whole gamut of issues revolving around the court system, the banking system, the illegal taxation and the attempt at creating a de-facto state apparatus that simply are not being addressed at these peace talks, much to the detriment of the Nation as a whole.

So, before a responsible minister of the cabinet pops the idea of a 'non-binding' Referendum, it would be imperative that the Government keep the people informed of all the details, plus the nuances involved in the "peace process" of which the public is repeatedly told, that they are stake-holders.

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