Party : Communist Party of Sri Lanka
Symbol : Betel Leaf
Name of the Current Leader : Maithripala Sirisena
Country : Srilanka
Home Page : cpsl [dot] lk
CONSTITUTION OF THE CEYLON COMMUNIST PARTY :
PREAMBLE :
** THE CEYLON COMMUNIST PARTY is the political party of the working class of Ceylon.
** The fundamental aim of the COMMUNIST PARTY is to achieve a Socialist Ceylon which will establish common ownership of national economy, end the exploitation of man by man and nationality by nationality, eliminate class divisions in society and so be able to plan the use of all Ceylon’s material, productive and scientific resources that every citizen will be guaranteed security, the right to work and leisure, a steadily rising standard of living liberty and equal opportunity for a free and happy life.
** The COMMUNIST PARTY believes that its fundamental aim can be attained only by the will of the great majority of the toiling pople, led by the organised working class.
** In furtherance of this fundamental aim, the immediate task of the COMMUNIST PARTY is to build a United National Front of the patriotic sections of the people of Ceylon to defend the country from fascist aggression and win its liberation from imperialist enslavement. It seeks to co-operate with all freedom-loving organisations and sections of our nation to win a free Ceylon which will guarantee complete democracy, equality among nationalities, the abolition of all feudal survivals in the countryside and the security of a decent standard of living and civic liberaties to every citizen and which will co-operate with all other nations of the world in close, friendly, free and equal association.
** The COMMUNIST PARTY is devoted to the defence and extension of the immediate interests of the workers, peasants and other sections of toilers by hand and brain who suffer under feudal, capitalist or imperialist exploitation. It takes and active part in the everyday struggles of the working class and the people and works steadfastly to strengthen their organisation, political understanding and activity, not only to advance their standards and conditions but also that the organised working class can unite and lead the people of Ceylon for independence and democracy and carry forward the advance towards the winning of Socialism and classless society.
** The policy and actons of the COMMUNIST PARTY are guided by the experience of the working class movement in Ceylon and by the general experience of woking class and popular struggles in other countries, which find their highest expression in Scientific Socialism, in the teachings of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin.
** In achieving its aims, the COMMUNIST PARTY will seek to lead the workers and people of Ceylon shoulder to shoulder with the workers and people of other countries in the common struggle for a world without oppression and war for a common brotherhood of man.
** To these ends, the COMMUNIST PARTY establishes the basic laws of its organisation in the following constitution.
NAME, EMBLEM & FLAG :
** The name of the organisation shall be the CEYLON COMMUNIST PARTY.
** The emblem of the Party shall be a red, five-pointed star, bearing on it the design of a crossed hammer and sickle, representing the unity of workers and peasants, together with the circular inscription “CEYLON COMMUNIST PARTY†in the Sinhalese, Tamil, Malayalam or English language as the case may be.
** The flag of the Party shall be a red flag. bearing on it the design of a crossed hammer and sickle.
STRUCTURE AND ORGANISATION :
The structure and organisation of the COMMUNIST PARTY is based on the principle of DEMOCRATIC CENTRALISM.
This means that :
** All leading Committees of the Party, from bottom to top are elected whereever the conditions of class struggle permit the holding of elections ;
** The leading Party Committees regularly report on their work to their Party organisations ;
** The Party has only one set of rules and uniform Party discipline, which are equally binding on all members and are strictly enforced ;
** The Party maintains the strictest unity of will and action through the minority voluntarily submitting to the majority, the lower Party organisations to the higher Party organisations and the various Party organisations to the central leadership of the Party ;
** The Party has only one leading organ – the ALL CEYLON PARTY CONGRESS and, between two Congresses, the Central Committee elected by the last Congress.
The supreme authority in the COMMUNIST PARTY is the ALL CEYLON PARTY CONGRESS which is responsible for the adoption of general policy and for laying down the general lines of work of the Party. The functions of the All Ceylon Party Congress are :
** To discuss, confirm or amend the report of the Central Committee and other Central Party institutions ;
** To revise and change the program and constitution of the Party, if necessary ;
** To decide the tactical line of the Party on the basic qustions of current politics ;
** To inquire into and decide such appeals and other matters as are referred to it ;
** To elect by majority vote, the Central Committee and the Control Commission ;
** To appoint, form among the Party members, an Auditing Commission to check and audit the finances of the Party and report on them to the next Party Congress.
The Party Congress, which shall ordinarnly be held every year, shall be considered properly constituted if it has delegates representing not less than half the membership of the Prty represented at the last Congress. Repretentation quotas at the Congress shall be decided by the Central Committee.
The agenda and preliminary materials for a Congress shall be prepared by the Central Committee and issued to Party organisations at least six weeks before the date fixed for the Congress and shall be considered and discussed by all Party organisations and members.
Resolutions for the Congress agenda, amendments to draft resolutions issued by the Central Committee and nominations for membership of the central bodies of the Party may be sent to the Central Comittee by the Party organisations up to two weeks before the date of the Congress. The Central Committee may also its own nominations for election to the central bodies.
Special All Ceylon Conferences of the Party may be convened between two Congresses by the Central Committee on its own initiative. The Central Committtee shall convene a Special Conference upon a request of Party organisation having a representation of not less than one-third of the total number of members represented at the last Party Congress. Special All Ceylon Conferences shall be composed in the way and shall have the same powers as the Party Congress.
ENFORCEMENT OF DISCIPLINE :
** Presevation of the unity of will and action of the Party demands the strictest diciplene and consistent struggle against the anti-Party tendencis of forming factional groupings (i.e, Parties withn the Party with separate platforms and policies opposed to that of the Party) and provoking factional struggles or divisions withn the Party. In order to preserve Party unity and Party discripling gaisnst fuctional grouplings, the Centeral Committee shall have the right to apply all Party penalties up to the point of expulsion from the Party in cases of violations of discipline or the existence of factions.
** The decisions of the leading Party organisations must be carried our exactly and properly, Individual members failing to do so may be punished by censure, public censure, removal from responsible post, suspension or finally, expulsion from the Party. Party Committees or other organisations failing to do so may be punished by censure, public censure or in the case of a Committee, by the dissolution of the Committee and the nominatin or electin of a fresh one and in the case of an organisation of the Party by the dissolution of the organisation concerned.
** Any Party member found gilty of strike-breaking, betraying Party confidences, financial irregularities, consorting with the enemiese of the Party, the working class or the nation, habitual drunkenness, moral degeneracy, police provocation or otehr conduct or actions detrimental to the Party the working class or the nation, or tending to lower the prestige of the Party in the eyes of the pubic, shall summarily be expelled form the Party and exposed before the general public as such.
** All Party organisations shall have the right to bear and take disciplinary action against any individual member or organisation under their jurisdiction, subject to the confirmation of the disciplinary actions of lower organisations and to the right of appeal, on the part of those against whom such action is taken up to the Control Commission the Central Committee and the All Ceylon Party Congress.
PARTY FINANCES :
** No entrance fee is payable by members upon joining the Party.
** Every member shall pay regularly every month the Party dues according to the rates fixed by the All Ceylon Party Congress or between two Congresses, by the Central Committee.
** Any member who is three months in arrears in the payment of his or her dues shall cease to be a member of the Party, unless adequate reasons cna be shown why the dues have not been paid
** In the case of members who are unemployed the Party organisation in which he or she works shall have the right to reduce or waive the payment of dues by such member during the period of unemployment, provided such member agrees to pay to the Party all outstanding sums upon resumption of employment.
** Twenty five percent of the money receieved through the payment of membership dues shall be paid by each Party organisation to the Central Committee, while the remainder may be retained by the organisation for its own expenses.
** The central funds of the Party shall be controlled by the Central Committee.
** The Central Committee shall have the power to fix and collect levies on the incomes of Party members for the central funds of the Party.
** The Central Party Treasurer shall submit at each meeting of the Central Committee a statment of accounts of the central funds the Party.
The Secretaries of teh various Party Cells and organisations shall submit a monthly statment of their accounts to the Central Party Treasurer.
The Central Committee and the Auditing Commissin appointed by the last Party Congress shall have the power to call at any time for a statement of accounts from the Central party Treasurer or from the various Party organisations and to verify the correctness of such statements.
Headquarters :
Postal Address
No. 91 Dr. N.M. Perera Mawatha, Colombo 08.
Genearl Numbers :
+94-11-2695328
+94-11-2669889