Ceylon Today Editorial

What Maithri and Ranil should do!

Tuesday 10th November 2015

 
Minister of Law and Order and Prisons Reforms, Tilak Marapana tendered his resignation as Minister to President Maithripala Sirisena yesterday following his controversial statement in Parliament on the Avant Garde Armoury deal which was challenged by his party colleagues and the JVP Opposition. The Media said on Sunday that a one-on-one meet between the President and Prime Minister was due last morning, but Marapana who met the Premier on Sunday night decided to tender his resignation yesterday. Unconfirmed reports said the Prime Minister had requested him to resign his portfolio.
Marapana who summoned a hurried news conference at his residence said he was resigning his ministerial portfolio as the public no longer had faith in him to continue in the position and he was quitting allowing an impartial investigation in the Avant Garde affair. The former Attorney General Marapana is the instructing counsel for Avant Garde Chief Nissanka Senadhipathy. He told Parliament last week that the Police was trying to score points by trying to make Avant Garde guilty when all issues had been done in a legal manner. Marapana's statement annoyed many of his Cabinet colleagues as the alleged Avant Garde fraud was the key slogan of the then UNP opposition against the previous Rajapaksa regime. The JVP Leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake also challenged Marapana's statement.

Minister Rajitha Senaratne claimed that Premier Ranil Wickremesinghe offered the portfolio of Law and Order to Marapana on the condition that he (Marapana) would refrain from commenting or interfering with the Avant Garde probe. If that is true, Marapana had breached the trust placed on him by the Prime Minister even prior to violating collective Cabinet responsibility by making a statement in Parliament without the concurrence of the Cabinet. Marapana is a very senior lawyer and a former Attorney General. It would have been better if he had requested another ministry when Cabinet portfolios were discussed at top level to avoid embarrassment as he was the instructing counsel for Avant Garde. He accepted the portfolio of Law and Order under which the Police was placed being aware that an issue of conflict of interest prevailed.

Adding insult to injury, Marapana who tendered his resignation yesterday, told the media briefing that he believed that his client Avant Garde would be cleared of all charges.

Marapana's hope to have Avant Garde cleared following his resignation from Cabinet raises another issue. He is a Member of the government that had directed the Police to probe a corrupt deal. Can a Member of that Government continue to look after the interest of Company as an instructing counsel which is under probe for corruption? Should such a Member be allowed to remain as an MP of the government that had initiated such a probe? If that Member was an Opposition MP there would be no such doubt about his presence in Parliament. There is doubt that if Marapana continues in the government and is offered another Cabinet portfolio, that indirect pressure could be mounted on the investigators. It is incumbent upon the President and Prime Minister to clear all such doubts if the duo is committed to uphold the policy of Good Governance.

The Avant Garde controversy also surrounds Ministers Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe and Vajira Abeywardene. Rajapakshe is on record saying he prevented the arrest of former Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa by influencing the President and the Premier. That is a very serious statement. Rajapakshe as Justice Minister has no right to influence the Head of State and the Prime Minister or to interfere in the investigations. Recommending an arrest of a suspect is the sole right of the Attorney General (AG) that depends upon the evidence placed before the AG by the Police or the CID. In dragging the President and the Prime Minister of the country towards an unlawful act, Minister Rajapakshe had brought the first and second citizens of the country into disrepute and embarrassment. Hence, Rajapakshe's statement need to be probed and an appropriate action taken against him as the people would lose faith in the law enforcement and judicial system in the country when the Justice Minister conducts himself in a manner to display that he has authority to influence the Head of State and the Prime Minister and override law and order and the judicial system.

Government ministers and MPs claim that they have evidence to prove Minister Vajira Abeywardene's link with Avant Garde Company. It was reported that he had accompanied Avant Garde Chief Nissanka Senadhipathy to meet the President on 10 January, but had not introduced Senadhipathy by name to the President in the midst a host of well wishers who were present to congratulate the newly elected President. The President last week denied having met or known a person called Senadhipathy. The President is honest as Abeywardene had not introduced Senadhipathy by name. The Prime Minister should inquire into this allegation made by his party MPs and UNP ministers. A Government of Good Governance cannot make space for Ministers or MPs to back corruption. The Most Venerable late Maduluwawe Sobhitha Thera gave his life and time towards the tail end of his life to Maithri and Ranil to rid the country of corruption and punish those who have indulged in corruption in the past to ensure Good Governance. Therefore, upholding the pledge of Good Governance is the greatest tribute that Maithri and Ranil could bestow on that great Thera who will make his final journey on Thursday.

Daily Mirror Editorial

The Buddha Dhamma and the Judicial Service

Tuesday 10th November 2015

 

The nation is paying a glorious and unprecedented tribute to the prelate the Ven. Maduluwawe Sobitha Hamuduruwo who in his vision and mission was like a model proactive judge holding the scales evenly and getting closely involved in the battle for social justice for all people whether they be rich or poor, the powerful or the powerless. This would be an appropriate time to reflect on the Noble Eight-fold Path and Sri Lanka’s judicial process which during the past 15 years was severely undermined and suffered body blows from party political leaders. Along with the attack on judicial independence, we also saw a breakdown in the rule of law, leading to authoritarian trends which leaders such as Sobitha Hamuduruwo courageously challenged and fought against.

One of the world’s most eminent jurists, Justice C.G. Weeramantry, former Senior Vice President of the International Court of Justice has made an enlightened analysis of the positive effects the Buddha Dhamma should and could have on the judicial process. Justice Weeramantry says that in its noblest dimension the judicial service is one of the highest forms of responsibility that any individual is called to. An important source of wisdom which can illuminate judicial responsibility is the vast repository of instruction concerning human conduct contained in the teachings of the great religions.

Regretting the growing separation between law and religion, he says religious teachings could make wonderful contributions to sustain a wiser, more equitable, more humane and more understanding discharge of judicial responsibility. According to Justice Weeramantry, Buddhism has a wealth of teaching and minute analyses regarding the working of the human mind.
 

Likewise, Christianity, Hinduism and Islam are also vast reservoirs of wisdom and inspiration for judicial conduct. An area of deep relevance to the judiciary which is as yet largely unexplored in the judicial context is the teaching of Buddhism regarding the rules of righteous conduct. According to Justice Weeramantry, right thought has been deeply analyzed in Buddhist teachings and includes concepts of detachment, helpfulness, concern for others and diligence. There must be an elimination of irrelevance, partiality, anger, jealousy and enmity.

Buddhism also says right concentration is a prerequisite to right decision making. The factors impeding right concentration are numerous. They include both physical and mental drawbacks ranging from hunger and anger to false impressions about parties caused by wrongful processes of assessing people. Indeed, concentration of mind is a subject perhaps better developed in Buddhist literature than even in the books on psychology.

According to the scholar judge, right concentration by itself does not suffice. Buddhist thought takes us further into the necessity for right mindfulness. A case affects not only the two parties involved, but others around them and society as a whole. This wider also perspective needs to be taken into account by the judge. One must be mindful of the effect of one’s decision upon those around the litigants. It must be perceived as a fair judgment. Sufficient reasons must be given for the judgment. Judges often deliver judgments without due consideration of the need to make the reasons for their decisions clearly understood by litigants and by society in general. This means that the judge must take great care in formulating the judgment so that the reasons for it becomes patently clear and acceptable to all.

There should also be mindfulness of the practicality of one’s decision and mindfulness that one’s decision may have a progressive or a retarding influence on the development of the law. There should also be mindfulness of the need to temper law with justice and mindfulness of the shortcomings of the legal system.

Justice Weeramantry says Buddhist thought regarding correct decision-making also goes into the area of right vision. Correct decision-making requires a long-term view of the consequences of the decision for the future. In legal systems based on Common Law procedures, decisions of the higher judiciary themselves make law and Supreme Court judges need, therefore, to be intensively concerned with the long-term effects of their judgments. A long-term vision is therefore essential to the proper discharge of their functions.

If Buddhism thus requires long-term vision for the decisions an individual takes even more so would it require such a long term vision for judges.

Justice Weeramantry has also analyzed the other dimensions of the Eight-fold Path, right livelihood, right speech, right action and right effort. It would be good for members of the Judicial Services’ Association, the Bar Association of Sri Lanka and others to meditate on these dimensions in the new mission to restore the nobility and independence of the judicial service.