William Gopallawa

William Gopallawa MBE (Sinhala: විලියම් ගොපල්ලව, Tamil: வில்லியம் கோப்பல்லாவ; 17 September 1896 – 31 January 1981) was a Sri Lankan statesman who served as the last Governor-General of Ceylon from 1962 to 1972. That year, Ceylon became a republic, and changed its name to Sri Lanka; he would serve as the first and only non-executive President of Sri Lanka until 1978.

Gopallawa served as Governor-General during the tenure of three different governments, two headed by Sirimavo Bandaranaike of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party and one headed by Dudley Senanayake of the United National Party. Gopallawa has been described as a reformist.

William Gopallawa was born on 17 September 1896 at the Dullewe Maha Walauwa, Dullewe, Aluvihare, a suburb of Matale. He was related to Dullewe Dissava, a signatory on behalf of the Sinhalese to the Kandiyan Convention of 1815, by his mother Tikiri Kumarihamy Dullewe. His father, Tikiri Bandara Gopallawa, died when he was three years old.

Gopallawa received his primary education at the Dullewe village school and at St. John's College, Kandy. He continued his secondary education at Dharmaraja College, Kandy where he was a Scout and later moved to St. Anthony's College, Kandy. After having sat the Cambridge Senior Certificate Examination in 1917, he returned to Matale and joined as one of the tutorial staff of Buddhist English School. He was instrumental in setting up a library and a scout troop at the school.

In 1920, Gopallawa joined Ceylon Law College in Colombo and was enrolled as a proctor and notary public in 1924. He started his legal practice as a junior to Bernard Aluwihare in the unofficial bar of Kandy and went on to develop a practice in Matale, Dumbara and Kandy from 1924 until he took up duties as Municipal Commissioner in 1939. He continued his practice on and off until he became the Municipal Commissioner of the Colombo Municipal Council.

In 1926, Gopallawa contested and won in the Matale Urban Council elections, and served continuously in the council for a period of 13 years from 1926 to 1939. He served as the chairman of the Matale Urban Council for 5 years, and was the youngest Urban Council Chairman in Ceylon at the time. In 1936, Gopallawa unsuccessfully contested for the Matale seat in the 1936 Ceylonese State Council elections.

In 1939, the Kandy Municipal Council was established and Gopallawa was appointed as the first municipal commissioner of Kandy. He served in this capacity throughout World War II and acquitted himself for efficiency during the intense floods in 1950. In 1951, he was appointed as municipal commissioner of the Colombo Municipal Council and served until 1957, when he stepped down from the post. He was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire in the 1953 Coronation Honours.

On 18 June 1958 when S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike's government started diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China, Gopallawa was posted as the second Ambassador to China in 1960. On 7 September 1961, while he was serving in China, he was recalled and posted as the Ambassador to the United States; he served there until 1962.

In 1962, Gopallawa was called back to Ceylon, after his son in law's sister, then-incumbent prime minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike, nominated Gopallawa as governor-general of Ceylon following Sir Oliver Goonetilleke's implication in the failed military coup attempt earlier that year. Gopallawa was the second native Ceylonese governor-general and the first Buddhist to hold the post as the viceregal representative of Queen Elizabeth II, who was the head of state. Gopallawa served in this capacity until 1972, when he became the first president of Sri Lanka.

Gopallawa's constitutional decision to invite the United National Party (UNP), which won the majority of parliamentary seats in the 1965 general election, is heralded as a landmark moment where he respected the nation's constitution and its people's wishes more than the wishes of the defeated Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) government who had first appointed him, who wanted him to delay inviting the winning party to form a government. Gopallawa's decision averted a major crisis of leadership.

When Ceylon became the Republic of Sri Lanka on 22 May 1972, Gopallawa became the island's first president. Like the post of governor-general which it replaced, the presidency was largely ceremonial. Gopallawa stepped down from the presidency in February 1978, when then prime minister J. R. Jayewardene drafted a new constitution and created the executive presidency, thus enabling Jayawardene to ascend to the presidency.

Summary of international trips

Gopallawa made 2 foreign trips to 3 countries as president.

1975

1977

• Member of The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 1953
• LLD (Honoris Causa) from the University of Ceylon in 1962
• LLD from the Vidyalankara in 1962
• D.Litt. from the Vidyodaya in 1962