GOVERNOR OR MAYOR?

 

The Jaffna Taxi driver said to us that Mayor Manivannan had beautified the big lake area known as Ariya Kulam in Jaffna town. This was on 31 December 21. I registered it as per my experience of Manivannan as a lawyer. Today I came across the interview with the  Governor of Northern Province Mr Jeevan Thiagarajah – under the question whether Ariya Kulam  was being converted to Buddhism? -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZMknP-cYbg

 

So, who had ownership at the public level? – the Governor or the Mayor? The answer lies in the feeling which is the Ultimate Root Cause of manifestations. The governor gives us a clue about his thinking that the judiciary works on the basis of facts and that this would prevent ‘personal’ opinions being used in decision making. But what if that personal opinion was based on belief? Is that not a ‘fact’ as well?

 

During his representation of our matter, Mr Manivannan failed to turn up on a particular day due to strike action by a section of the Bar Association. We were informed by Mr Manivannan only that morning – that he would not turn up due to the Bar Association strike. I informed him in return that I would attend as per Due Process. I was acting as per the Administrative Pathway which requires us to ‘show’ both side participation on equal footing. The footing here is the rule of the Court Administration.

 

On that day Mr Parathalingam PC was present to represent our Opposition. I was shocked to learn that Mr Parathalingam who and agreed to represent us in a Land matter in Colombo was appearing for our Opposition in the Testamentary matter in Jaffna Court of Appeal. He lacked the courtesy to inform us through our instructing solicitor.

 

Judge Ilanchelian presided. The judge called all lawyers concerned to his chambers and since Manivannan was missing and we were not invited it was like a political meeting of lawyers. The head of the party was  Mr Parathalingam PC, who got to his feet and declared that he would move to have the appeal dismissed – as if we had committed a cardinal sin by failing to inform him- the lord of justice! Judge Ilanchelian in turned warned us to the effect we were wasting the Court’s time!

 

I got to my feet, ignoring the warning signs of the Police officer signalling me to sit down, and stated that as I had filed the Appeal Application, I would argue the case. Then Mr Parathalingam stated that the proxy would need to be withdrawn! Judge Ilanchelian with a small smile on his face asked me to inform our lawyer of the new Court date.

 

In the area where I was the judge – I wrote asking our instructing lawyer Mr Manoharan to terminate the services of Mr Parathalingam in the Colombo land matter. That case was won the two years later in Colombo – with the Court of Appeal delivering results that upheld all our contributions to the Judicial system. Mr Harsha Fernando who represented us never failed to include our contributions which were largely our declarations of belief.

 

Where the Jaffna Public are the judges I would certainly rate Mayor Manivannan far below Governor  Thiagarajah.  That positioning would have been higher if Governor Thiagarajah had demonstrated confirmation that as the representative of the Government, the Governor was responsible for the Court Administration also.

 

As per our experience, the Registrar looks to the Judge to deliver Administrative decisions. This is in breach of the Doctrine of Separation of Powers between the Judiciary and the Executive government that has responsibility to decide on the basis of their Administrative structure – using the same law.

 

The serious breach of this doctrine has resulted in our Opposition assuming Administrative authority which was never asked for in their Application and also in the Registrar of the Court collecting the monies from the bank accounts of the Deceased -Mr Subramaniam Yoganathan of Vaddukoddai – making a mockery of the Vaddukoddai Resolution.

 

The fundamentals of this case were stated to be based on Thesawalamai law. But the final judgment was by Common Law -insulting our ancestors who gave us the Thesawalamai law. Then at UN we boast that North is our Traditional homeland! This case outcome is proof that the Jaffna lawyers and judges desire the outcomes of both!  What they NEED is separation of powers and not the land.