Parliament

House passes Amendments of Local Authorities(Special Provisions)Bill

Sandasen MARASINGHE and Irangika RANGE

The Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa presided when Parliament met at 1 pm yesterday. After the presentation of papers and oral questions the House took up the committee stage debate on the Local Authorities (Special Provisions) Bill and the Local Authorities Elections (Amendment) Bill.

Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe: We support these amendments. This is a blend of electoral and preferential vote systems. We expect that the third reading too will end today. I too hope this amended system will be used in the upcoming elections.

Local Government and Provincial Council Minister A.L.M. Athaullah: Today is a historic day for this country. Members in the same party entered into frays and fought each other due to the preferential voting system. On the other hand, the voters did not know who they were selecting as their representatives. Therefore this is an initiative taken to remove the preferential voting system, to make the way for voters to select their representatives. This was a promise given by President Mahinda Rajapaksa to the people. We also have plans for delimitation of the electorates.

It will take at least one year. We also discussed to reduce the deposit amount of candidates at elections. I request all the members to support to pass these bills.

John Amarathunga (UNP): We support this Bill. The Opposition Leader too said so. Why don't we introduce the electronic voting system as we amend this Act?

Local Government and Provincial Councils Minister A.L.M. Athaullah: We will do it together.

Sajith Premadasa (UNP): The representation of youth in the Provincial Councils and Local Government bodies in 1989 was between 30 percent and 40 percent. This was a result of a decision taken at the Youth Unrest Committee. But now that rate has been reduced to 12.5 percent. The Women's representation in these institutions was around 1.87 percent in 2006. However 50.3 percent of population in Sri Lanka are women. So these figures should be increased.

Ajith P. Perera (UNP): I don't make any amendment. That does not mean these are perfect Bills. However we have to pas this principle first.

Joseph Michael Perera (UNP): I thank Minister Dinesh Gunawardena and others for this commendable move.

After taking into consideration the experience of this system at this level, the committee agreed to adopt this system to other bodies and also to the General Election as well.

Anura Kumara Dissanayake (DNA): We have a question on the preferential voting system.

It has deteriorated the political culture of this country. We should not, in the guise of changing that system adopt another system that would not properly reflect the wishes of the people.

We have to make many amendments to this Bill. We should introduce a system to reflect the wishes of the people but not one enabling the rulers to remain in power after victory.

We have to without delay commence discussions to introduce further amendments needed.

Local Government and Provincial Council Minister A.L.M. Athaullah: I thank the Speaker and others for supporting to make the amendments.

I thank all the others who suggested amendments.

I am happy that I could make these amendments during my period as the Minister.

Rosy Senanayake (UNP): On this historical day I suggest that the women's representation should be increased as stated in the Mahinda Chinthanaya. As mentioned earlier, the women's and youth representation should increase compulsorily to 25 percent each.

Irrigation and Water Resources Management Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva: Today is a historic day, that we could pass this Amendment Bill which was a long felt need, with the support of the Opposition. Nowhere in the world has a perfect Act been introduced. Changes and amendments were made from time to time. The President took a decision to amend this Bill. He is not a short sighted leader. We also thank Minister Dinesh Gunawardena for his special contributions.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sumeda G Jayasena: Women's representation in the political field all over the world is commendable. So we have to consider increasing women's representations in these institutions at least to 25 percent.

Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe: The initiative to make this amendment was taken in 2002 when I was the Prime Minister in this House.

Rural Affairs Senior Minister Athauda Seneviratne: I thank the President for taking initiatives to make these amendments. We too like if women come forward to represent the public.

Construction, Engineering and Common Amenities Minister Wimal Weerawansa: People of our country suffered for a long time due to this preferential vote system. The people actually wanted some change.

We believe this new election system would help strengthen the democratic rights of the people.

Shantha Bandara (UPFA): The percentage of youth representatives will be increased through this system.

Justice Minister Rauf Hakeem: This will help minor parties to elect their representatives to the local bodies without any hindrance.

Lakshman Kiriella (UNP): The UNP gave its fullest support to pass two Bills. Now we need the Independent Election Commission to be set up soon before the next election.

A.H.M. Azwer (UPFA): This is a historic achievement in the Sri Lankan history. We must thank President Mahinda Rajapaksa for his endeavour to achieve this target.

Kamala Ranatunga (UPFA): The percentage of youth and women representatives will be increased through this new system.The two Bills were passed with amendments.

The House was adjourned until 1 pm today.

[Ranil welcomes amendments]

Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe welcomed the amendments of the Local Authorities (Special Provisions) Bill and the Local Authorities Elections (Amendment) Bill presented in Parliament yesterday. He said that the new system should be considered a pilot project and that initially after applying it to the local government elections, the same could be applied to other elections. He said the Opposition would support the amendments and hoped that they would be successful.

['University lecturers to end strike after press conference today' - minister]

Higher Education Minister S.B. Dissanayake told Parliament yesterday that a joint press conference would be held today (11) with university lecturers to inform the public of the agreements reached, with regard to the ending of the on-going strike. He said that the university lecturers would end their strike action after the press conference.

The minister responding to a special statement made by Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe on the previous day in Parliament, said that several rounds of talks were held with a view to finding solutions to the grievances put forward by the university lecturers.

"As we could not reach an agreement, the lecturers were directed to the Presidential Secretary Lalith Weerathunge but there was no solution. The issue was then directed to the Labour Commissioner. However even this did not reach a solution. Then, on my invitation Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa entered into talks. These talks resulted in an agreement to meeting eight of the university lecturers' demands. We thereafter submitted a note to the Cabinet and obtained its approval. The university lecturers then held talks with the Treasury Secretary on the basis of this note. Following this, the lecturers started a long march which put the talks on hold. After their march they met Minister Basil Rajapaksa again on September 09. These talks were fruitful and the results would be announced in the joint press conference on Thursday", he said.

LG election law amendments passed:

PR on the way out

Parliament yesterday unanimously passed the amendments to the Local Government Election Law heralding the end to the controversial preferential vote system which was blamed for much of the intra party clashes during elections.

The Local Authorities (Special provisions) Bill and the Local Authorities Elections (Amendment) Bill were passed in committee.

The amendments will see the electoral process revert to the ward system under which 60 percent of the councilors will be directly elected to Municipal Councils, Urban Councils and Pradeshiya Sabhas while the remaining 30 percent will be elected under PR system under the amendment.

The amended one will be a mixed system between Westminster and Proportional Representation systems to elect members to the local authorities in future.