President clarifies post-impeachment – ‘Peiris did not endorse
everything as advisor’
Former A.G Mohan Peiris was the best person to be appointed Chief
Justice, ‘Otherwise I would not have appointed him,’’ said President
Mahinda Rajapaksa speaking to the heads of national media last night at
Temple Trees.
“There may have been others as well, but he was certainly among the
best for the appointment,’’ he said.
The fact that Peiris was an advisor to the Cabinet once, is no bar to
such an appointment, he said.
He recalled that former Chief Justice Neville Samarakoon was a very
upright CJ, but he had been the personal lawyer for former president J.
R. Jayewardene.
As for the new Chief Justice Mohan Peiris being a former cabinet
advisor, the president said that as advisor he advised the cabinet ---
but that role was not one of endorsing everything that the government
did.
“When we did wrong, he pointed out what was wrong, and when we did
right he said it was right – that’s what is meant by advice, it does not
mean being a ‘yes man’ of government by any means.’’
He said in all the impeachment was good for the country, though those
nations that have always had an agenda against Sri Lanka will try to use
it against us. Asked about Supreme Court judgments on the impeachment,
he said if you take the rules of court, they are not in the constitution
– likewise this was a different matter, as their judgments impinged on
matters constitutionally within the purview of Parliament.
Asked about the high-level US delegation that is in the country, he
said that ‘People come and go’ and that “no doubt they may work to
agenda – they don’t come to say hi hello and go.’’
That theirs is a routine visit and they are working to a pre-planned
agenda are both views that are probably right, the President said,
laughing.
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