Thilanka Kanakarathna Courtesy The Daily Mirror

There is no legal provision in the present Constitution of the country to implement a special court, former Minister of Justice MP Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe said.

Speaking to journalists outside a function on Friday Mr. Rajapakshe said he does not like to comment over the topic as the decision over the special court is not finalized but there is sufficient legal provisions in the country.

He said when the matter was discussed in the Cabinet, Attorney General (AG) had replied with a report consisting 29 pages that the Parliament has no legal power to appoint such court in order to the 1978 second republican constitution.

However, he said according to world acceptable practice special court can only be implement by the Chief Justice (CJ) over the request of the AG who were independent parties and the politicians cannot implement such.

He further said the AG has the complete freedom to request the CJ to appoint a special Court comprising with a trial bar over any public interesting in grave crime.

He also said that it was taken in practice in the past in cases such as S.Vidya’s Murder case and Udathalawinna massacre.

Meanwhile, attending an event in Colombo former President, MP Mahinda Rajapaksa said appointing such special court is against the Constitution.

Constitution should be amended if it is needed to do so. It is not possible to change the Constitution in order to the intentions of politicians whenever they want,” he said.

Further, he said it was wrong if appointing a special court to gain political revenge.

While commenting over the subject, former Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa said it was observed the attempt was to gain political revenge using democratic institutions over political intentions.