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Uproar over 20A unfair as it will give President powers enjoyed by his predecessors- Minister Lanza
State Minister for Rural Roads and other Infrastructure Nimal Lanza says that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa will not be given any special powers under the 20th Amendment, which were not vested in his predecessors and therefore the protests against it are unfair.
Addressing a ceremony held at Nuwara-Eliya to inaugurate road development projects there, State Minister Lanza said former presidents J.R. Jayewardene, Ranasinghe Premadasa, D.B. Wijetunga, Chandrika Bandaranaike, Mahinda Rajapaksa and Maithripala Sirisena exercised more power than the incumbent President.
The Minister said that 6.9 million people had voted for the President to abolish the 19th Amendment. “We saw how national security collapsed under the 19th Amendment. The economy was ruined. The 19th Amendment was used to rob the Central Bank and the then President could not remove the Governor of the Central Bank responsible for the crime. That was why we promised the people that we would do away with the 19th Amendment and they gave us mandates at two elections.”
