COLOMBO, 23 July — Sri Lanka’s embattled president vowed yesterday to push through controversial constitutional reforms without parliamentary approval if she won a mandate at a referendum next month, state radio said.
President Chandrika Kumaratunga called an Aug. 21 plebiscite on a new constitution after suspending parliament ahead of a no-confidence vote in her minority government, a move which has brought the opposition onto the streets in protest.
“The present constitution could be amended without a two-thirds majority (in parliament). How this will be done will be revealed in due course,” the radio quoted Kumaratunga as telling a meeting of ruling party delegates in Colombo.
Arab News sources revealed, however, that special national forum will be set up to help draft the new charter.
The forum will be representative of all sectors of society, sources said.
Constitutional change in Sri Lanka needs a two-thirds majority in parliament, something Kumaratunga failed to accomplish last August when she tried to ram through the reforms only to have them shelved amid massive street protests.
Those demonstrations were dwarfed last week when opposition supporters marched on the capital Colombo in the face of a fierce police crackdown that left two dead and 80 injured.
The opposition accuses Kumaratunga of taking the country towards dictatorship, but the radio station quoted her as saying history was full of leaders who stepped “outside the perimeter of the national constitution for the wel-being of the people.”
Kumaratunga has blamed the constitution, enacted in 1978, for many of the country’s ills, including a complex electoral system that makes it difficult for any party to obtain a large majority in parliament.
