Demystifying System Change System Change: a frame work Definition of State
Demystifying System Change
System Change: a frame work
Definition of State
Sri Lanka is a free sovereign state where equal rights of each and every citizen independent of race religion and gender is guaranteed by this constitution and any law, regulations that confers advantages or places disadvantages based on race religion gender shall be void.
Official Language
Official Language of the state shall be Sinhala, Tamil and English and the state organs will communicate with the citizen in their Language of choice
Conflicts in Languages of Law
All laws, regulations in all three languages will be valid and if there are discrepancies,
in a litigation between the state and the Citizen, choice of the Citizen will determine the language which is to be used.
When the litigation is between two citizens, litigating parties could agree and if there is a disagreement, judge may determine based on jurisprudence.
Horizontal Separation of powers
People elected Legislature will review the Legislation and budget either presented by Executive or their own or will have the power to accept or reject them as laws and they will not be part of the Executive and cannot hold any Government office
Executive power will be held by a citizen-elected-Executive who will choose his Deputies
Judiciary representatives will be elected jointly by the Executive and the Legislature as stated elsewhere in this document
They will hold office until they retire voluntarily and they cannot hold any office after retirement.
Vertical separation of powers
Governance will be divided amongst
Central Government
Regional Councils based on SWRd’s speech in Jaffna in July 1926 in Jaffna and BC Pact 0f July 1957
Capital Region (Western)
Maya Rata(Central and Subragamuwa)
Raja Rata (North central and North Western)
Ruhunu(Southern and Uva)
North Eastern (North and East)
Local Bodies
Central Government will handle
Finance
Defense
External Affairs
Justice
Infrastructure Air Transport, Sea Transport, Highways, Communication
Regional Council will govern.
Land and Land utilization
Law and order
Industry
Agriculture
Transport Other than Air, Sea and Highways
Education
Health
Culture
Local bodies will govern as it is but the administrative functions will be performed by officers.
Compensation of the Legislature and Executive will be determined by tan independent public service commission and increase cannot exceed Consumer price index published by Central bank and cannot be done for the current tenure of office
Election
All Elections Central, Regional, and Local will be held on Fixed date (September 1st)with cooling period to appoint Ministers, Senior positions in the Government and take over on December 1st every four years
Election for President/Governor his chosen two Vice presidents (preferably three of them each representing one of the major communities in Sri Lanka and first Vice president will take over if the President is incapacitated) and Governor of Regional council and his chosen one deputy will be based on Candidate getting more than 50% based on
First count, if not
including counting second preference votes
Election for central, regional Legislature and Local bodies will be based on well-defined electorates based on voting population of one member for every 100.000 or specified land area for central legislature with 150 members and 50,000 for regional legislature totaling 300 for all regional councils. Number of Local governments will be on the basis 1977.
Finance
· Finance for government will be based on Taxes levied by each of the Levels of governments
Checks and balances
· Legislature will organize themselves into sectoral committees
o to study in detail the laws submitted by executive and
o to Review and approve nominations submitted By Chief Executive for Ministers, Judicial officers of Courts, independent positions and commissions, diplomatic heads, Administrative heads of Ministries and heads of Government Institutions
§ These reviews will be by public hearing open to print, electronic, web media.
§ Approval for appointments preferably must be unanimous or in exceptional case by 75% of the Sectoral committee.
§ This mechanism allows appointment to top posts are
· Politically Neutral
· Review function is distributed to maximum number of elected people
· Very Transparent
· Chances of Meritocracy is much better
· Changes to Constitution should be ratified by 2/3rd majority of the Central and each of the Regional Legislature.
Laws to be strengthened
· Forbidding Members of Government and their immediate family members dealing in contracts directly or indirectly through nominees or shares owned in companies with state violation means criminality
· Strong anti-corruption law confiscating property of bribe taker/giver and their immediate family members
· declaration of annual assets and liabilities of members of Government., Top officials and immediate members of the family
· Repeal of PTA/ATA
Judicial administration
· All Judges will serve until they are able to discharge their duties and can not hold any office during service or after retirement
· Only one appeal and at least one appeal is permitted details to be worked out
· All appeals except central government issues to be settled in the regional Court of appeal
· All cases should be disposed within 3 months in appeals and 6 months in courst of first instance in criminal cases after filing of charges
· This will be faceted by extended hours hearing, limited time for oral representation and abolition of court vacations
· Any judge who do not ensure this could be removed from the position
· Strengthen the reconciliation process for minor cases first by designated JPs and then by reconciliation board.
· Implement electronic systems to improve efficiency of case administration and criminal investigation
By Kugathas Ramathas / Colombo / Sri Lanka
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