Shirani’s last sitting
By Dharisha Bastians
Witnessing the downfall of the Supreme Court had been as painful as the personal impact of her unlawful sacking in 2013, newly reinstated Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake said yesterday.
“Today marks 746 days since I left office on the basis of an unlawful and illegal impeachment,” Chief Justice Bandaranayake told a packed ceremonial chamber on the fifth floor of the Supreme Court complex.
Just 24 hours after she was reinstated as Chief Justice of Sri Lanka, Dr. Shirani Bandaranayake bid farewell to the Supreme Court at a ceremonial sitting held at Hulftsdorp to mark her retirement from office. Her final speech was the first and most extensive statement Bandaranayake has ever made about her controversial sacking in January 2013. Pin-drop silence greeted her poignant speech, in the grand chamber filled with judges, senior lawyers, state counsels and law students.
“Since January 2013, our lives were in turmoil and peril. In that time my family encountered immeasurable harassment and suffering,” she told a packed chamber.
The 746 days since her impeachment, had been like a sentence of imprisonment, the country’s first female Chief Justice told judges and lawyers at Hulftsdorp in her final speech from the bench.
“For those who have devoted their lives to their profession, the compulsion to refrain from it unjustifiably, is a sentence of imprisonment. When such compulsion is based on baseless allegations such imprisonment is made even more rigorous and torturous,” Bandaranayake observed.
“It is with great admiration for my country and its people that I graciously accepted a resumption of my duties yesterday,” the 43rd Chief Justice said.
Bandaranayake noted that her two-year battle was not personal. “It was fought to uphold the rule of law and the integrity and independence of this institution. I may come and I may go, what matters is not the individual who holds this esteemed office but the continued existence of its independence,” she said.
The country’s 43rd Chief Justice said that she was thankful to be saying goodbye on a day that will be looked back upon as one in which time and nature had brought about justice. She welcomed the appointment of her successor, Justice K. Sripavan, the senior most judge of the Supreme Court who will be appointed Chief Justice following her official retirement.
Bandaranayake said she firmly believed Justice Sripavan “deserves this opportunity to become the legitimate 44th Chief Justice of the Republic.” Mohan Pieris originally succeeded Bandaranayake as Chief Justice following the impeachment, but President Sirisena yesterday revoked the appointment, saying it was void and without force in law, since Bandaranayake had not been legally removed.Thanking the younger members of the legal fraternity for fighting against her impeachment, Chief Justice Bandaranayake said she felt reassured that the future of her profession lay in safe hands. Bandaranayake said she could have served on the Supreme Court until her 65th birthday, in April 2023. “However, at the time I was appointed as CJ in May 2011, I decided to have a five-year plan for the enhancement of the Judiciary and retire in 2015, in my 58th year,” she said.
The BASL bids adieu
Announces that Govt. has accepted BASL proposal for special committee to make appointments to Apex court
Attorney-at-Law and rebellious head of Sri Lanka’s unofficial Bar, Upul Jayasuriya, called on Shirani Bandaranayake to accept responsibility for the introduction of the 18th Amendment and saluted her courage while bidding her a poignant farewell at her last ceremonial sitting. |
