The Friday Forum now wishes to urge the President to release, without delay, the Report in full for public review and discussion. There have been conflicting statements from various sources in this regard and a clear statement from the Presidential Secretariat as to when the report will be released in full will be welcome. It will be appreciated that public commissions of inquiry are appointed by the President on behalf of the people and the costs of their sittings, deliberations and submissions are met from public funds. Their report therefore belongs to the people who must be given the earliest possible opportunity to review and engage in a discourse on it. We know of no democracy where reports of public commissions of inquiry, not involving matters of state or military security, are withheld from public discussion.
Such public discourse will no doubt help in facilitating the effective implementation of the Commission’s recommendations. Over a year ago, the Commission released its interim report and the President correctly appointed a Committee headed by the former Attorney General to look into implementing those interim recommendations. Unfortunately, Friday Forum’s efforts to obtain from that committee a report on the progress it had made in implementation have not proved fruitful. We request that H E the President, in the same spirit that he appointed these eminent persons to the LLRC, to set up a more effective mechanism to implement the final recommendations of the LLRC.
The Friday Forum is of the view that there is no reason now to delay the release of the LLRC report in full. Only such a step will honour the integrity of the learned Commissioners of the LLRC. It will also be in line with the commitment made by the government, locally and internationally, that the government appointed the LLRC to be transparent in its sincerity towards upholding human rights and values in war as in peace. Withholding the report, or any part of it, from public scrutiny will seriously affect our credibility as a nation. The release must be followed up, after public discussion, with a plan to effectively implement the LLRC’s recommendations.
Jayantha Dhanapala