• Prog. being planned following Basil-Ranil meeting

The ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) stated that a programme is currently being planned to involve former Local Government (LG) representatives for ongoing development projects.

Speaking to The Daily Morning, the SLPP’s General Secretary and Government Parliamentarian, Sagara Kariyawasam said that this issue was also discussed in the talks held between the SLPP's founder and former Minister Basil Rajapaksa and President Ranil Wickremesinghe. 

“There is no preparation to hold the LG elections yet. The LG representatives have been sidelined with no responsibility. Therefore, Rajapaksa requested the President to involve them in the development projects. The President had expressed his agreement for that, and a programme is being prepared.”

The LG elections, which were scheduled to be held in March 2023, and then in April 2023, were indefinitely postponed due to the Election Commission (EC) not receiving the necessary financial allocations from the Ministry of Finance. President and Finance Minister Wickremesinghe and many other Government representatives said that it was difficult to allocate the necessary money to hold the LG elections in the current economic climate.

Meanwhile, in a letter addressed to the EC, the local elections monitoring body, the People's Action for Free and Fair Elections recently pointed out that even though the LG elections were postponed indefinitely, the elections were not cancelled, meaning that the pre-election laws are still in effect. It also highlighted that political parties and candidates could gain unfair advantage from the planned implementation of the development projects by the political authorities, and hence urged the EC to take appropriate action.