Ranjan calls for justice through courts

COLOMBO (News1st): Opposition lawmaker Ranjan Ramanayake has said he is seeking a judicial system that issues fair verdicts regardless of a person's status. He made these remarks responded to claims of influencing judges in the verdict that sentenced former parliamentarian, Duminda Silva, to death. "If a deputy minister like myself could contact judges, just imagine how many calls would have been made by the President and Prime Minister," the Samagi Jana Balawegaya parliamentarian remarked. Silva was sentenced to death over the killing of former parliamentarian Bharatha Lakshman Premachandra by a three-member judge bench. Ther verdict was upheld by another five-member Supreme Court judge bench that dismissed an appeal filed against the sentence. "They say that I had contacted only Padmini Ranawaka Gunathilaka. But the other judges have ruled that Bharatha Lakshman had been murdered," Ramanayake noted.