Democracy: No platform for malice

Democracy is the ‘Government of the people’ and hence one should not lose cite of the fact that it is still ‘the government’ though it is ‘of the people’ and hence it leaves no room to be construed as some form of ‘anarchy by the people’

In an ideal democratic situation the members should be taking decisions of policy and governance in managing an institution but in running a country the people have to be contended by appointing the representatives to govern the country for a stipulated period.

Thus once the contenders to the office agrees to a particular process of election and governance they are all morally bound by that process irrespective of whether you win or lose the elections. Hence for democracy to survive, those who are elected to govern as well as those who are not able to govern, should both be democratic and as much as the Government should respect the rights of the Opposition, the Opposition too should respect the right of the Government to govern.

The present Opposition in Sri Lanka however, does not seemed to understand this and in their view democracy bestow an unbridled right on the Opposition to oppose with malice everything that the Government does and further they seemed to think that all activities they indulge in, with a covetous eye on power, could be covered by the blanket of ‘democracy’.

Vote banks

In keeping with this attitude the Opposition parties (UNP and JVP) has decided to call the proposed 18th Amendment to the Constitution ‘undemocratic’ and mark the day it is being tabled in Parliament by hoisting black flags.

The Opposition has a duty by the people to explain this stance without just resorting to this ballyhoo and at least now they should realize that it is their own such irresponsible behaviour at important junctures that has caused an erosion in their vote banks for the past few years.

The amendment under question has two proposals and the changes they sought to effect are that;

* the number of terms a candidate is permitted to hold the office of the President should not be confined to two and

* that it should be mandatory upon the President to sit in Parliament at least once in three months to answer the Members of Parliament on matters of governance.

As regards the first proposal, what the Opposition has to explain is, why it is ‘dictatorial’ to give the voters in this country the choice to elect a particular candidate to the office of the President for a third term if the voters consider that candidate to be suitable? And further why is the Constitution imposing such limits only on the person who is successful at the Presidential Election when there is no such limit on unsuccessful candidates; they can contest any number of times? Then again since we are Republic it is the people that have the sovereign power and in such a context why should we hold a Constitution sacrosanct and thereby undermine the people’s sovereignty?

Then on the other proposal, why is it ‘undemocratic’ to make the President’s answerable to the Parliament on a mandatory basis in place of the current position where such answerability by the President is voluntary? Isn’t it the Opposition that has been droning day in and day out that we need to make the office of President answerable to the Parliament?

If the Opposition is unable to provide satisfactory answers to these questions through their propaganda mediums in the next few days, it should be reasonable for us to assume that the Opposition is against;

* the first proposal because they know that unless they clip the incumbent President with a constitutional constrain they will not have a hope in hell of winning an election.

* the second proposal because they would rather have the slogan of ‘President the non answerable dictator’ than have that position corrected by having the President answerable to the Parliament.

The present Government made it very clear at the last General Elections that they wished to bring in suitable amendments to the present Constitution and for that they sought a mandate from the country. The people, despite Opposition warning, have now given that mandate to the Government and hence the Opposition has no earthly ‘democratic’ right now to scare monger the public about the ‘Government ushering in a dictatorship’.

Presidential Election

The main argument of the Opposition against the incumbent President at the last Presidential Election was that, ‘since the incumbent President is coming for his last term the chances are that he would abuse powers and play hell like what JR and Chandrika did in their last terms’. If that argument is to have at least a modicum of credibility then that is all the more reason why we should not restrict the term of a President to a ‘constitutional ultimatum’.

The bane of democratic politics since independence in this country has been the ‘time serving’ nature of our leaders and that is mainly because the comparatively short life span of the Government made every leader a ‘six year strategist’ who contrived to win the next elections than serve the country.

Who is the political leader who will want to embark on long-term development plans for the country when it is clear that his survival depends on his ability to keep the masses happy in the short term? If our ancient kings had six year terms, would they have made those massive tanks and the frescoes?

In a democracy the performance of a Government depends on the power and authority people repose on it and as long as that power is used within the permitted framework, there should be no question of that Government acting undemocratically. But on the other hand, if the Opposition in any way tries to undermine the Government from exercising that rightful power bestowed by the people, then it is the Opposition and not the Government that would be acting undemocratically and dictatorially!

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