Five Interesting Facts from the History of Sri Lanka's Governance

When it comes to the history of Sri Lanka’s government, there are some incidents and facts not

widely known or are known mainly by the older generation of Sri Lankans due to many years passing

since its occurrence. In this article, I am compiling five interesting facts from the history of Sri Lanka’s

governance. It begins 87 years ago.

1. Ministers without Ministries

Before Sri Lanka’s (then Ceylon) Independence in 1948, from 1931 to 1947 there were Ministers but no Ministries under the Donoughmore Constitution. I wonder how the government functioned at this time without Ministries. A possibility I can see is that there was a group of staff under all Ministers performing the responsibilities of Ministerial staff.

2. Ministers without Portfolios

Sri Lanka's first Cabinet was appointed 71 years ago on the 14th of October 1947, the day of the first session of Sri Lanka’s Parliament known then as the House of Representatives. In this Cabinet, there was a Minister (R.S.S. Gunawardena) without a portfolio. He was also Chief Government Whip who was unseated via an election petition on the 12th of March 1948. R.S.S. Gunawardena continued to function in his positions until replacements were made in May 1948. Interestingly his successor A.E. Goonesinghe also functioned as a Minister without Portfolio and a Chief Government Whip, though he also got assigned the Minister of State portfolio on the 26th of July that year. I’m interested to know what these Ministers functions were. Perhaps their work included working on topics not covered in the other Ministerial portfolios. 

3. Parliament with Two Houses

As pointed out above, Parliament was known as the House of Representatives at the time of Sri Lanka’s independence. The House of Representatives was one of two houses of Parliament, with the House of Representatives being the Lower House and the Senate of Ceylon being the Upper House. The House of Representatives at its first sitting had 101 MPs, with 95 elected and six appointed by the then Governor-General who represented Britain’s monarch. The Senate had 30 members with 15 members being elected by the House of Representatives and 15 nominated by the Governor-General on the Prime Minister’s advice. The Senate was led by a President and it enabled a system of accountability towards the House of Representatives. This institution continued until its abolishment in 1971. I intend to write about the Senate of Ceylon in a future article.

4. The First Speaker Standing Up to the Prime Minister

The first Speaker Francis Molamure is reported to have told Prime Minister D.S. Senanayake to take his seat. Nihal Seneviratne, former Secretary-General of Parliament revealed in a conversation (video in link) with political scientist Asoka Obeyesekere that he was told that the first Speaker said to Prime Minister D.S. Senanayake: “Honourable Prime Minister, I think you are being irrelevant. Please take your seat.” I hope to see this happen again.

5. Two MPs for Kalawana

Following the 1977 general election, there were two people claiming the seat of Kalawana, a town 106

km from Colombo in the Ratnapura district. The seat was won by Mr. Abeyratne Pilapitiya of the

United National Party (UNP), the party which won the general election. For some reason, it was

challenged by Mr. Sarath Muttetuwegama of the Communist Party of Sri Lanka (CPSL) who

contested against him via an election petition. Mr. Pilapitiya was involved with an accident, and stayed

away from Parliament without requesting leave. As a result of this, he lost his seat which was

believed to be an intentional move on his part. His party then nominated him to fill the vacancy,

changing his position from an elected MP to a nominated MP. In late 1980, the election petition result

in the Supreme Court unseated Mr. Pilapitiya and a by-election was conducted in January 1981 that

elected Mr. Sarath Muttetuwegama.

At about the same time, the government led by then President J.R. Jayewardene brought in a bill, the Third Amendment to the Constitution that would enable the Kalawana electorate to have two MPs, one elected and the other nominated. The Supreme Court ruled that this amendment required both a two-thirds majority and a referendum. Though the bill was passed with a two-thirds majority, a referendum was not held. This issue was concluded with Mr. Pilapitiya resigning resulting in Mr.Muttetuwegama taking his seat as the MP for Kalawana. This shows an instance of the judiciary preventing presidential abuse of power.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed these five facts from the history of Sri Lanka’s governance. I’d be interested in

hearing from anyone who remembers any of these happenings, knows more details or has similar

stories they’d like to share.