The Court of Appeal has fixed 14 September to hear a writ petition filed by MP Dilith Jayaweera challenging a contempt of court complaint referred to it by the Fort Magistrate.

The Magistrate concluded that remarks Jayaweera made during a television programme prima facie amounted to contempt of court and referred the complaint upward, NewsFirst reported.

The petition was taken up before a bench of President of the Court of Appeal Justice Rohantha Abeysuriya and Justice Priyantha Fernando.

What a writ application means here

Jayaweera is not contesting a contempt conviction — no finding has been made against him. He is asking the Court of Appeal to review the referral itself, the standard route for challenging whether a lower court had the basis or jurisdiction to act as it did. A successful application would stop the contempt proceeding before it is heard on its merits.

Context

Jayaweera leads Sarvajana Balaya and entered Parliament at the 2024 general election. He has been an outspoken government critic, describing the administration in August as drifting towards the authoritarianism of the J.R. Jayewardene era and arguing in June that the government was misusing the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

He has faced contempt allegations before. In June the CID pursued contempt charges against Jayaweera alongside Wimal Weerawansa and Udaya Gammanpila in connection with the Easter Sunday attacks investigation. NewsFirst does not say whether Thursday’s matter arises from that thread or from a separate complaint, and this article does not assume it does.

Update (September 18): order reserved for September 30

The Court of Appeal will deliver its order on the writ application on 30 September, Hiru News reported on Friday.

The court made that order after considering the petition on Friday before a three-judge bench led by President of the Court of Appeal Justice Rohantha Abeysuriya. Hiru describes the relief sought as an order invalidating the contempt-of-court complaint presented against Jayaweera before the Fort Magistrate’s Court.

Two things have changed since the 10 September report. The matter was listed for 14 September but was taken up on the 18th, and the bench has grown from two judges — Abeysuriya sitting with Justice Priyantha Fernando — to three, with Abeysuriya presiding. Hiru does not name the other two judges or explain the change in composition or the change of date.

This closes a gap flagged in our own coverage. Our report on the Court of Appeal’s contempt referral of six public figures noted that no outlet had said whether Jayaweera’s writ application was heard, withdrawn or decided, or how it interacts with the three-judge bench appointed on 15 September to hear the contempt case itself. It has now been heard and an order reserved — and the bench that heard it is a three-judge bench, though Hiru does not say whether it is the same bench appointed to the contempt case.

Hiru’s description of the relief — quashing a contempt complaint referred by the Fort Magistrate — matches the referral in the Suresh Salley satyagraha thread, in which the Fort Magistrate referred Jayaweera and five others to the Court of Appeal over statements allegedly made between 7 and 15 July.

The Daily Mirror, filing separately on Friday afternoon, states the connection outright: the contempt proceedings were initiated before the Court of Appeal against six individuals, including Jayaweera, on a complaint filed by Colombo Fort Magistrate Pasan Amarasena, who alleged that statements had been made in connection with court proceedings involving retired Major General Suresh Sallay.

That closes the question this article had left open. The writ application and the six-person satyagraha referral are the same proceeding, and the alignment no longer has to be inferred.

The Daily Mirror also names the full bench that Hiru left unidentified. It is a three-judge bench comprising President of the Court of Appeal Justice Rohantha Abeysuriya, Justice Chamath Morais and Justice Adithya Patabendige. The Daily Mirror’s spelling of the President of the Court matches Hiru’s — Abeysuriya — against the Abeysooriya form carried elsewhere in our archive.

The same Court of Appeal is separately due to rule on 27 November on whether Sallay himself may proceed with his own writ application. Neither outlet notes that the two matters, arising from the same underlying case, now sit before the same court on separate timetables.

No finding of contempt has been made against Jayaweera, and the writ application does not contest a conviction — it challenges whether the referral should have been made at all.

Not reported

Neither outlet says what grounds were argued on Friday, whether counsel appeared for the Attorney General, or what happens to the contempt proceeding in the meantime — whether it is stayed pending the 30 September order or continues in parallel. Neither explains why the matter moved from 14 to 18 September, or says whether the television interview at the centre of the complaint was screened in court. Neither names the other five individuals referred alongside Jayaweera, or states what the statements at issue actually said.

NewsFirst does not identify the television programme, the date of the broadcast, or what Jayaweera actually said — the substance on which the whole proceeding turns. It does not name the complainant, say which case the remarks are said to have concerned, or state the grounds advanced in the writ application. No response from the Attorney General’s Department is recorded, and no other verified newsroom had filed on the hearing date at the time of writing.

Sources