Dual-citizenship blowback
15 May 2017
The SLFP (Maithri faction) may not have thought its desperate move
to deprive the Joint Opposition (JO) of one MP would lead to such a huge
blowback. It successfully moved the judiciary against UPFA MP and
Mahinda loyalist Geetha Kumarasinghe on the grounds that she had been a
dual citizen at the time she was nominated to contest the last general
election. The government which has not yet taken any action against
Treasury bond racketeers went hell for leather to have the court
decision implemented. Its selective efficiency is really amazing!
Kumarasinghe has appealed to the Supreme Court against the Court of
Appeal judgment and obtained a stay order, which is valid till today.
There
are said to be several dual citizens in Parliament including some
failed candidates appointed via the National List. The Court of Appeal
judgment, disqualifying Kumarasinghe from being an MP, is likely to lead
to a situation where the UPFA will lose several of its MPs with dual
citizenship within its ranks. Her disqualification should lead to the
cancellation of the UPFA’s Galle District nomination list, some legal
experts have argued. A similar situation is likely to occur in other
districts where the UPFA fielded dual citizens at the 2015
parliamentary polls. In such an eventuality, the UPFA may lose about 10
of its MPs including several National List members, some lawyers have
argued.
Activists of the People’s Action for Free and Fair
Elections (PAFFREL) are among those who argue that the Court of Appeal
judgment at issue could lead to several legal challenges against the
lists of UPFA candidates in Galle and Matara Districts where dual
citizens contested the last general election. There is, however,
another school of thought, which claims that the question of the entire
UPFA nomination list being rejected does not arise and only the MP
concerned will lose her seat.
The legal requirement that
MPs, unseated due to being a dual citizen at the time of contesting,
return what they have obtained by way of salaries and perks reminds us
of a presidential decree which caused a Chief Justice to disappear, so
to speak, soon after the 2015 regime change. There are some unresolved
issues concerning the post of the head of the judiciary from 2013 to
2015 and they are bound to manifest themselves sooner or later.
One
may recall that in 2015, President Sirisena decided that the
impeachment of Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake in 2013 was illegal,
the post of the Chief Justice had not fallen vacant and, therefore, her
successor, Mohan Peiris, had never been the CJ! Now that Kumarasinghe
has been required to return what she has received as an MP from the
state, the question is why no such action has been taken in respect of
CJ Peiris, who had not been the CJ according to the President! Peiris
headed the judiciary, heard cases, wrote and signed judgments and other
vital documents, made appointments, drew the salary of the CJ and
enjoyed various perks. Strangely, the government hasn’t taken any
action to recover the losses the state has suffered as a result? Is it
because the yahapalana leaders fear that the matter will end up in
courts if they try to do so and, therefore, don’t want to open up a can
of worms for themselves?
It is being argued in some
quarters that the dual citizenship issue has led to a legal battle as
there was some confusion at the time of the submission of nomination
papers in 2015 over the 19th Amendment’s bearing on the existing
election laws. Some returning officers disregarded objections to the
nomination of the candidates alleged to be dual citizens, stating that
the courts would sort out the issue later. This is what happens when
politicians introduce constitutional amendments in a hurry and
implement them without giving two hoots about the need to update the
existing laws in line with them.
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