Provincial polls cannot be held without delimitation report; SC tells President

The Supreme Court has informed President Maithripala Sirisena that the provincial elections cannot be held under the existing or previous Provincial Council's Elections Act without a delimitation report.

The delimitation report which demarcates provincial boundaries had been defeated in Parliament after being prepared by a five-member committee in 2017. 

The committee had been appointed after the Provincial Council Elections (Amended) Act was passed in order to conduct the elections under the mixed voting system - which combines the simple majority and proportional representation systems.

A delimitation review committee headed by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had then been appointed to address the shortcomings in the defeated report and submit a report to the President, but had failed to do so, the President’s Office said.

Accordingly, the President last month sought the Supreme Court's opinion on whether the polls could be conducting using the defeated delimitation report under the Provincial Council Elections (Amended) Act or the previous act which existed before being amended in 2017.

A five-member judge bench which then communicated its opinion to the President had stated that the elections could not be held without the delimitation report under the new Act since the President does not have the authority to act on the defeated delimitation report.

The judge bench had also noted that the polls could not be conducted under the old Act according to the Interpretation Ordinance.