PC Elections could be held on 19 January 2019: Party leaders

• Review Committee appointed with PM as chair to address relevant issues and expedite process

The Party Leaders decided yesterday that the Provincial Council could be held on 5 January 2019 if the Parliament could reach an agreement on what electoral process to follow, and other issues, before October end.

The decision was taken at a Party leaders’ meeting held yesterday at the Parliamentary complex.

The meeting was held to deliberate on what measures could be taken to hold PC polls in a timely manner.

In addition to the Party leaders, the Chairman of the Elections Commission, Attorney General, Chairman of the Delimitation Committee, and the Secretary of the Ministry of Provincial Councils and Local Government also took part in the meeting.

A review committee to resolve issues regarding the electoral process was also appointed with the leadership of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, and consisting of Opposition Leader R. Sampanthan, Minister Nimal Siripala De Silva, Chairman of the Election Commission Mahinda Deshapriya, and Chairman of the Delimitation Committee K. Thavalingam.

The meeting was chaired by Speaker Karu Jayasuriya.

According to Parliamentary sources, the Speaker had pointed out that civil societies and rights groups had called for their public representatives to be selected beyond the preferential voting system.

However, the Speaker had noted that the public would not approve if there was an unnecessary increase in the number of councilors.

The Chairman of the Elections Commission had remarked that the Commission would take the required steps to conduct elections as soon as Parliament reached a final decision on the matter.