CPA STATEMENT ON CONSTITUTIONALITY OF THE SLPP NATIONAL LIST APPOINTMENT

Basil Rajapaksa’s name was not included in the list of persons qualified to be elected as Members of Parliament, in terms of Article 99A of the Constitution (the “National List”) or any of the district lists submitted by the SLPP for the Parliamentary Election held in August 2020. [...] The practice of appointing “any member” of a political party, who was not nominated at the relevant election, violates the franchise of the people which is part of the sovereignty of the people (Article 3 of the Constitution). [...] If as the Constitution suggests the people are indeed the sovereign of the Republic, then the people should know before an election who the political party intends to appoint to Parliament. [...] Allowing political parties to appoint whomever they wish to fill vacancies which are engineered for that purpose, undermines the value of the franchise of the people and unnecessarily and arbitrarily inflates the power of the leadership of political parties. [...] CPA thus calls on the SLPP and all other political parties to respect the provisions of the Constitution and the franchise of the people.