Sri Lanka’s Superior-Court Vacancies Return to Parliament: Where Is the Accountability?

Months after lawyers warned that vacancies were burdening the country’s highest courts, Parliament has recorded a fresh opposition request for debate. The issue now requires an updated public accounting, not speculation.

22 October 2026 • Lanka Witness Evidence Desk

On 20 October, Parliament officially recorded that the Opposition had requested a debate regarding delays in filling vacancies in the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal. The announcement returns a long-running institutional concern to the parliamentary agenda.

In July, the Bar Association of Sri Lanka urged President Anura Kumara Dissanayake to fill what it described at the time as four vacancies in the Supreme Court and four in the Court of Appeal. The BASL warned that prolonged vacancies could burden serving judges, delay cases and weaken public confidence. Those numbers should not simply be carried forward as today’s count without an updated official statement; the present accountability question is precisely what positions remain vacant now, for how long, and what stage each appointment has reached.

The government has offered an explanation

In August, President Dissanayake said the timing of appointments was connected to the Easter Sunday attacks Trial-at-Bar and the consequences of elevating a senior judge involved in that case. He said he expected to complete the appointments within about a month and rejected suggestions that vacancies were being held open to favour a particular individual. That explanation deserves to be represented alongside the criticism.

Since then, Parliament has passed the Twenty-Second Amendment altering retirement arrangements for superior-court judges. The Supreme Court had determined that the constitutional amendment did not require approval at a referendum, subject to wording addressed in its determination. Debate over retirement ages and debate over vacancies are related to judicial capacity, but they are not the same question.

What transparency would look like

A useful parliamentary debate should establish a dated vacancy table, the constitutional appointment pathway for each post, nominations or approvals already completed where disclosure is lawful, and the operational effect on pending caseloads. That would replace political inference with an auditable institutional record.

Judicial independence is not protected by assuming bad faith, nor by asking the public to accept unexplained delay. It is strengthened when appointments follow constitutional safeguards and the reasons for exceptional delay can withstand public scrutiny.

Lanka Witness assessment: The government’s Easter-trial explanation is part of the record, as are the Bar’s warnings. Parliament now has an opportunity to establish what changed after the President’s August commitment and publish enough information for the public to judge the institutional consequences.

Image: Mystìc / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0.