Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0338/03384.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 32KB | 510 lines

$Unique_ID{COW03384}
$Pretitle{296}
$Title{Sri Lanka
Chapter 4B.   Presidency and Parliament}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Peter R. Blood}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{party
parliament
government
tamil
unp
sri
slfp
parties
constitution
election}
$Date{1990}
$Log{}
Country:     Sri Lanka
Book:        Sri Lanka, A Country Study
Author:      Peter R. Blood
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1990

Chapter 4B.   Presidency and Parliament

     The most important national office is that of the president, who is
defined in the Constitution as head of state, chief executive, and commander
in chief of the armed forces. Although governmental institutions are divided
in the customary way between the executive, legislative, and judicial
branches, the president's powers as chief executive are formidable compared to
those of the legislature. Thus, it cannot be said that the Constitution
provides the political system with the benefits of a genuine separation of
powers.

     With Parliament's approval, the president appoints the prime minister and
in consultation with the prime minister chooses the members of the cabinet. It
is the chief executive, rather than the prime minister, who presides over the
cabinet's deliberations, and who may assume any ministerial portfolio. The
president also has the authority to dissolve Parliament at any time and call
for new elections. The president cannot exercise this power, however, if the
legislature has been in power for less than a year and does not consent to the
dissolution, or if it is considering a resolution to impeach the president.

     A striking feature of the governmental system is the huge size of
cabinets. The Constitution designates twenty-eight minister- level portfolios,
including two (the ministries of defense and plan implementation) held by the
president. Additional ministers, however, may be appointed to take
responsibility for special areas, such as the prevention of terrorism.
District ministers, who play a major role in local government, are also
designated. Including deputy ministers, a cabinet at one time may have more
than eighty members chosen from the parliamentary ranks of the ruling party.
In the late 1980s, ministerial rank and the resources made available through
access to budgetary funds were, for individual legislators, an invaluable
source of patronage and local level influence.

     The president can announce a national referendum to seek popular approval
of proposals of pressing national importance, including bills that have been
rejected by Parliament. Other presidential prerogatives include declarations
of war and peace, the granting of pardons, and the exercise of broad emergency
powers. In the event of a public emergency, the president can invoke the power
to enact measures without the consent of Parliament. The legislature, however,
must convene no more than ten days after the chief executive's proclamation of
an emergency. If a majority of the legislature fails to approve the state of
emergency after two weeks, it automatically lapses; it lapses after ninety
days if a simple majority of the members of Parliament do not approve its
continuation.

     The president is popularly elected for a term of six years. He or she may
serve no more than two consecutive six-year terms. The Constitution
stipulates, however, that the term of a chief executive who assumes office
other than through a normal presidential election will not be counted as one
of the two. Whether this means that Jayewardene's first term from 1977 to
1982, which began with his election as prime minister in the 1977 general
election, would be counted toward the two-term total was unclear. The Third
Amendment to the Constitution, approved in 1982, allows the president to hold
a presidential election at any time following his fourth year in office.

     The Constitution states that the president is responsible to Parliament
and can be impeached by the legislature if that body approves the measure by a
two-thirds vote and the Supreme Court also calls for his or her removal from
office. Grounds for impeachment include mental or physical incapacitation,
moral offenses, abuses of power, bribery, treason, and blatant violations of
the Constitution. The prime minister assumes the responsibilities of the
president if the incumbent is disabled or is overseas. Parliament chooses a
new president if the incumbent dies or leaves office before the end of his or
her term.

     During the mid-1980s, the powers vested by the Constitution in the chief
executive, the unprecedented majority that the UNP won in the July 1977
election, the 1982 postponement of a new general election until 1989, and a
strong tradition of party discipline provided Jayewardene virtually
unchallenged control over Parliament. The Constitution gives the legislature a
term of six years. But in November 1982, Jayewardene, elected the previous
month to a second six-year presidential term, announced his decision to hold a
popular referendum on a constitutional amendment, the fourth, which would
extend the life of Parliament from six to twelve years (a general election was
due by August 1983). As justification for the amendment, he cited both his
popular mandate (he won 52.9 percent of the votes cast in the October 1982
presidential election compared to 39.1 percent for his nearest opponent) and
the threat posed by an "anti- democratic, violent and Naxalite group"
associated with the opposition SLFP that allegedly planned to seize power and
"[tear] up all constitutional procedures." (The term "Naxalite" refers to
a leftist, revolutionary and violent movement that emerged in India during the
1960s.) After approval by Parliament and the Supreme Court, the amendment was
supported by a narrow 54.7 percent of the voters on December 22, 1982. The
fact that the referendum took place during a state of emergency and that there
were widespread reports of voter fraud and intimidation caused many to doubt
the legitimacy of this procedural exercise. Observers noted, however, that
members of the opposition were allowed to express their opinions freely prior
to the December 22 vote and were given access to the media, including
television. The Constitution stipulates that when the next general election is
held, the number of members of Parliament shall be increased from 168 to 196.

Local Government

     Because Sri Lanka is a unitary rather than a federal state, local
government institutions have had a very limited role in the political process.
The country traditionally has been divided into nine provinces, which had
played an important administrative role during the British colonial era. The
principal local government subdivisions since the early 1980s have been the
twenty-four administrative districts (see fig. 1). Before 1981 each district
contained administrative offices representing most national-level ministries
and known collectively as kachcheri (government offices). Two officers of
major significance at the district level were the government agent and the
district minister. Government agents, appointed by the central government,
traced their origins to the colonial era, but the office of district minister,
which was filled by individuals concurrently serving as members of Parliament,
was created after 1978. Because of the district ministers' access to central
government funds for patronage purposes, they tended to diminish the power and
influence of the government agents.

     In 1981 the kachcheri system and the subdistrict system of elective
village and town councils were replaced by district development councils and
subdistrict-level units known as pradeshiya mandalaya (divisional council) and
gramodaya mandalaya (village council) (see fig. 11). The councils were created
largely to satisfy minority aspirations for local self- government and were
designed to exercise a significant measure of autonomy, especially--as the
name implies--in the area of economic planning and development. Although