SC will not unnecessarily intervene in national issues- Chief Justice

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 July 2005, 16:15 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Supreme Court (SC) Tuesday reserved its order for Friday on the application of providing interim relief in the fundamental rights case filed by the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) against the Post Tsunami Operational Management Structure (P-TOMS). JVP fundamental rights applications came up before the three member-bench of the Supreme Court comprising Chief Justice Sarath N.Silva, Justice Raja Fernando and Justice Nimal Gamini Amarathunge on Tuesday for further inquiry, legal sources said.

The first petitioner in the FR case is JVP propaganda secretary and the second to fifth petitioners are former JVP cabinet ministers. The seventh to tenth petitioners are former JVP deputy ministers and the rest of the petitioners are JVP parliamentarians. All the thirty-nine JVP parliamentarians have filed this petition against the implementation of the P-TOMS, legal sources said.

The petitioners have cited signatories of the P-TOMS agreement, Mr.M.S.Jayasinghe, Secretary to the Ministry of Rehabilitation, Reconstruction and Reconciliation and Mr.Ranjan Shanmugalingam of the LTTE Planning Division, and the Attorney General as respondents, legal sources said.

Petitioners in their applications stated they have sought interim injunction on the implementation of P-TOMS in regard to regional committees and regional funds governed by the regional committees and not against the national committee and district committees, legal sources said.

Counsel on behalf of the petitioners argued the P-TOMS was fundamentally flawed. The agreement creates institutions, which will run parallel with the government agencies. The governmental authority is taken over illegally by the regional committees to be set up under the P-TOMS and that the regional committees are unconstitutional, they argued.

Counsel for petitioners further requested interim injunction against the set up of the Regional Committee to control the donor funds. P-TOMS is a miniature Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA), they argued.

At one stage the Chief Justice remarked, "an effective mechanism is necessary to rehabilitate and construct areas that do not come under government control. The Supreme Court will not intervene unnecessarily in the national issues."

Attorney General Mr.K.C.Kamalasbaeyson was also present in court.

The Chief Justice said at the conclusion of the inquiry that the SC Bench would deliver its order on Friday whether to issue an interim injunction sought by the petitioners or not. President Counsel Mr.H.L.De Silva appeared for the petitioners.

President Council Mr.Nigel Hatch appeared for the first respondent Mr.M.S.Jayasinghe, RRR Ministry Secretary, legal sources said.