APPEAL COURT RULES THAT IT HAS THE POWER TO CONSIDER LEGALITY OF THE APPOINTMENT OF TWO MPS
7th July 2004
The Court of Appeal today (7th July 2004) ruled that it does have the power to proceed to consider the legality of the appointment of RATNASIRI WICKRAMANAYAKE and any others appointed as Members of Parliament through the UPFA National List, although their names were not included in the National List published under Article 99A of the Constitution or in the Nomination Papers of the UPFA.
Justice Saleem Marsoof, PC, President of the Court of Appeal and Justice K. Sripavan, made order overruling the preliminary objections to the Appeal Court hearing two cases filed by the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) and Rohan Edrisinha, Senior Lecturer of the Colombo Law Faculty in that regard, which were raised by the lawyers for the UPFA General Secretary, Ratnasiri Wickramanayake and other respondents. The Court took the view that some of the issues raised as preliminary objections were premature while one did not arise.
The Court of Appeal will now proceed to consider the legality of such appointments, with these two cases due to be next taken up on 29th July 2004.
M. A. Sumanthiran and Viran Corea appeared for the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) and Rohan Edrisinha, respectively. Dr. Jayampathy Wickramaratne, PC appeared for the UPFA General Secretary. D.P. Kumarasinghe, PC appeared for Ratnasiri Wickramanayake. Anil Obeyesekere, PC appeared for Anuruddha Ratwatte (who was also tipped to be appointed in this way through the National List) and Ikram Mohommed, PC appeared for the SLMC General Secretary.
Dr. P. Saravanamuttu
Executive Director