Insisting that the President and Prime Minister being out of the country at the same time is not unprecedented, Minister P. Harrison said that systems were in place to carry out their tasks in their absence.
Speaking to journalists at the weekly Government press briefing this morning (13), Harrison said Government Ministers will undertake any matters assigned to President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe who are currently on official visits to Tajikistan and Singapore respectively.
Any administrative matters, said Harrison, will be looked into by the relevant secretaries and bureaucrats.
Commenting on a letter sent by Premier Wickremesinghe to President Sirisena calling the appointment of acting ministers unconstitutional, Harrison said the President had to quickly refill the vacancies left by the mass resignation of Muslim Cabinet, State an Deputy Ministers.
In his letter, Wickremesinghe complained that Sirisena had ignored his recommendations for the posts of acting minister.
Defending the President’s actions in this regard, Minister Harrison said the former had no choice but to hurriedly appoint acting ministers as less than a month was left to investigate allegations against some of the Ministers who resigned.
“Since there is a limited time period the president might not have thought too much at that about it,” said Harrison.
“The president will make it right later,” he added.
(Republic Next)