P’ment receives SC decision on IDP voter registration bill

Parliament received the Supreme Court’s determination over the Registration of Electors (Special Provisions) Bill with a minor adjustment and it was ruled to be consistent with the Constitution. According to Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, the definition of ‘Internally Displaced Person’ found in the Bill has to be amended as per the determination. 

The Registration of Electors (Special Provisions) Bill was moved last month in Parliament seeking lawmakers’ approval to grant the necessary provisions to register internally displaced people as voters in their respective electoral districts by using their last permanent addresses prior to 18 May 2009. The Bill moved in May provided for internally displaced persons to be registered as voters in the electoral district where they permanently resided prior to 18 May 2009.

“Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in the Registration of Electors Act No. 44 of 1980 and subject to Article 89 of the Constitution, any citizen of Sri Lanka who has been an initially displaced person, whose name appeared in the register of elections for any electoral district in the Northern Province or Eastern Province for any year until the end of 2009 and whose name has not been entered in any register in operation subsequent to the year 2009 will be able to register in the electoral district he had been living in prior to May 18 2009,” the Bill held.

Even though the Bill is valid for four years, those who have not reached their 18th birthday prior to being displaced will not be able to make use of the provisions in the proposed Bill to register themselves in their electoral districts. AH