SPEAKER GETS REPORT TODAY; NGO’S LIE ON PROCEEDINGS

* Fabricated account to malign PSC, locally, internationally

* Members prepare PSC report in quick time

The report of the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to probe the impeachment charges against Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake is to be handed over to Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa today, sources said. Our sources said the PSC was preparing the report last evening after the Committee met in Parliament.

The process was cut-short as there was no defence offered by the person facing the charges, who walked out of the proceedings. Meanwhile, a totally scurrilous fabricated version of what transpired in the PSC meeting when Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake walked out of the day before, was circulated yesterday in the form of a media release by an organisation called the Sri Lanka Colombo Lawyers’ Collective.

Headed by lawyer and NGO operative J C Weliamuna, the media briefing was set up by non-governmental organisation activists with the precise intention of distorting PSC proceedings and bringing the government into disrepute, particularly internationally.

The statement distributed at the press conference was unsigned, but purported to give an account of the PSC proceedings, and charged that the conduct of the PSC members was unbecoming.

The persons who distributed the media statement also took umbrage at perfectly reasonable questions asked by members of the PSC.

The press briefing was conducted in such a way as to give the impression that the Chief Justice’s Media unit was in operation. By all accounts, the information was fabricated, and calculated to malign the legislature and was in short -- untruthful.

Lawyers, prominent among them J. C. Weliamuna who held the meeting in Hulftsdorp were later seen briefing media persons separately after the unsigned press briefing was distributed among them.

Clearly the conveners contravened all constitutional norms and Standing Orders in purporting to give an account of the PSC proceedings - - an ‘account’ which was of course clearly distorted.