Presidential elections and abolishing Executive Presidency

Former President Maithripala Sirisena was reported to have addressed a group of SLFP supporters in Wennappuwa on Sunday, 11 February where he broke news, President Wickremesinghe has appointed a group of lawyers led by former Speaker Karu Jayasuriya to propose amendments to abolish the “Executive Presidency”. He is reported to have said, it could be a “referendum” that could come first, to postpone elections.

Two days later, addressing the SJB Lawyers’ Forum on 13 February, Sajith Premadasa was reported as having said, his party will push for elections before any amendment to the Constitution. S.M. Marikkar SJB Colombo district MP addressing the media had said, SJB would not endorse any attempt to eliminate the position before the election, as it would only serve to enable President Ranil Wickremesinghe and the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) to prolong their tenure in power (Daily FT/13 Feb).

How true and authentic is this news trope of abolishing executive presidency and postponing elections? President Wickremesinghe has been quite clear on having elections this year. Replying to a question on elections, posed by the Indian TV Channel WION a fortnight ago President Wickremesinghe was quite certain Presidential elections would be held before the end of the year. Presidential media division has also issued a statement confirming same, while the Elections Commission has confirmed, they have been allocated funds for the Presidential election. All that does not necessarily mean elections will be held. But to have elections political parties and social movements should keep pressure on Government.  

Getting back to the recent past, was there any promise of abolishing the Executive Presidency at the last Presidential elections four years ago in 2019 November? Presidential elections in 2019 November were about electing a “Sinhala-Buddhist Presidential Monarch” as strong as “Hitler”. All frontline candidates were competing for that Sinhala-Buddhist presidency. All candidates begged for votes to be the executive president. Not to abolish it. JVP/NPP Candidate Anura Kumara Dissanayake (AKD) at the launch of his election manifesto on 26 October told the audience, his first act as President would be to amend the Constitution to make it “mandatory for the President to implement his election manifesto”. That obviously was accepting the President as the Executive Head of the State.

The last feeble suggestion to abolish the executive presidency was in mid-October 2023, tossed around by an unnamed SLPP MP in Government. Both Sajith and AKD voicing their concerns about the “feeler” on abolishing the executive presidency, said they would support the proposal for constitutional reforms including the abolishing of the executive presidency on condition, parliamentary elections are held immediately. That anonymous “feeler” ended as just a “feeler”.

Why then is it in circulation yet again with unconfirmed sources? This time it was announced by the weakest in the parliamentary Opposition. They thus believe I guess, the best is to create confusion and provoke contradictory statements from Government ranks. Also, confusions in Sinhala South to deter people from getting into Presidential election frenzies with JVP/NPP pushing along untiringly for the next presidency.

For the SJB, it is a double-edged sword. They cannot oppose abolition of the executive presidency. They cannot also withdraw from the Presidential elections constitutionally required in seven or eight months. The SJB leadership tends to believe, it is the parliamentary election that would be of advantage to them. Therefore, they are making an effort to tie up abolition of executive presidency with parliamentary elections, that would retard the JVP/NPP campaign for presidency. There is also a division within the SJB with Rajitha Senaratne contradicting its leadership wanting the abolition immediately, asking why presidential elections should be held, if it is to be abolished thereafter. There were also random assumptions the media gave prominence to, that abolition of the executive presidency is mooted with an intention of postponing all elections.

For the society, what is important is not what political remnants have to say about this latest news on abolition of the executive presidency. More important is the JVP stand on abolition of presidency. With amateur social opinion researchers predicting 50% of the votes for the JVP/NPP candidate AKD and their party campaigners who believe they have already won the upcoming Presidential election, JVP leadership need to say what they would do with the executive presidency. 

This present JVP leadership that regrouped during the post-insurgency period after they were brutally crushed by the Premadasa regime in 1990 November, was the first political entity that demanded the abolition of the executive presidency. They wanted the UPA candidate Chandrika Kumaratunga to promise in writing she would abolish the executive presidency within six months of assuming power, in return for their support to her at the November 1994 Presidential elections. The JVP then contesting the Presidential elections under Ariya Bulegoda’s Sri Lanka Progressive Front, withdrew their candidate, Nihal Galappaththi after Chandrika Kumaratunga gave the written promise.

From there onwards, while advocating the abolition of the executive presidency, the JVP was in alliance with all mainstream political parties, alliances and with elected Presidents Chandrika Kumaratunga, Mahinda Rajapaksa and Maithripala Sirisena, supporting the 2015 January Wickremesinghe Government as well. At no time has the JVP seriously lobbied for the abolition of the executive presidency in any of those alliances. Like all others, they have also used it as an election slogan. In March 2019 the JVP schemed with other political parties in Parliament to abolish the executive presidency with a 20th Amendment not quite sure they could make an impact at coming presidential elections. Since then, with JVP strictly focussed on presidential elections, they avoided discussing abolition of the executive presidency at the 2019 November presidential elections.

In their present foray into the next presidential elections this year, JVP has left two major issues completely outside their political rhetoric. One, is North-East post-war wounds yet festering and new issues like encroaching Tamil areas with Sinhala colonising. It was the JVP that intervened in July 2006 requesting for a de-merger of the merged North and East on three petitions filed with the Supreme Court. The five-member bench chaired by CJ Sarath N. Silva, the SC ruled the merger proclaimed by President Jayewardene was null and void and had no legality. Thus, the JVP position on the Tamil National Question, on 13A, devolution of powers to provinces are never openly stated with clarity. Wonder how AKD with no public stand on N&E would face the Canadian Tamil diaspora with his scheduled visit in a few weeks.

The second, the most important issue of executive presidency in relation to a JVP president elect needs to be assessed reckoning their party tradition of ruthlessly curbing dissent and political opposition. It is the present leadership that went around as provincial cadre, carrying “orders” from above during ‘88 to ‘90. They were brainwashed to believe all who oppose them are traitors and should be eliminated in the most ruthless fashion to teach others a “lesson”. This is not a political party that evolved over 58 years with organisational democracy. It evolved organising two armed insurgencies, the second far more brutal and savage than the first, as a vertically structured “command based” regimented organisation. 

Their interpretation of party democracy is no different to “democracy” allowed by Joseph Stalin in the Soviet Communist Party, called “centralised democracy” that left millions incarcerated in “Stalin’s gulags” in Siberia from late 1920s and most killed on framed charges. The Chinese Communist Party too is equally authoritarian even after Deng Xiaoping reforms. The elite in the party collected as the politburo keeps total control of the economy, the party bureaucracy playing the role of the State and the PLA. It is therefore important for the people to know how far this JVP leadership is willing to publicly dissociate itself from its past brutal and savage history. 

Important for JVP to clarify what former MP and a member of the leadership caucus Lal Kantha meant when he said, after they assume power, none would be allowed to cross their path in “developing the nation”. They will use the State machinery to control dissent and will have their own party cadre as well, he stressed. Added is the fact that the JVP takes extra effort in organising ex-military officers as a party forum in their ongoing electoral campaign. What role would they play in a JVP Government under an executive presidency? 

All that together demands the JVP leadership to officially say where they stand on executive presidency. It is extremely dangerous to allow a single individual to wield such power as the JVP maintained. AKD has been saying it is unbridled power in the executive presidency that allowed Rajapaksas to roll out unsolicited projects with mega corruption. It is also extremely dangerous to allow a political leadership with no democratic traditions and a regimented approach in politics carrying a heavy baggage to be allowed such executive powers. Social activists, trade unionists, professionals and academics therefore should keep asking AKD and the JVP leadership, “Would you abolish the executive presidency if voted to power?”