A group of State Ministers are getting ready to seek President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s intervention because they want to perform their duties. Despite the fact that State Ministers have been vested with considerable powers, as per the reports, they are facing challenges when it comes to using their powers to fulfill their duties and responsibilities.

As The Daily Morning reported yesterday (29), this situation has arisen because the officials of the institutions that come under the purview of specific Ministries heed only the instructions issued by the relevant Cabinet Ministers. Explaining the impacts of this situation, the State Minister of Ports and Aviation, Premalal Jayasekara noted that even though it has been several months since he assumed office as a State Minister, he has not had the opportunity to perform any significant work. He added that several State Ministers are facing the same situation, hence the decision to seek the President’s intervention.

This situation is indicative of a common issue that can be seen in many of the country’s affairs. That is, human resources, which in this case are State Ministers, are not being used in a beneficial and an effective manner because of poor governance. That is why certain public institutions have a surplus of employees while some do not have adequate staff. When it comes to State Ministers, the situation is more serious because the amount of public funds spent to maintain them, their staff and their offices is significant, and the duties they can perform and their role as law and decision makers, is massive. The need and uses of State Ministers when there are Cabinet Ministers and Deputy Ministers has been a controversial topic. However, if Sri Lanka continues to have State Ministers, it is imperative to see to it that those Ministers have duties and that those duties are fulfilled.

When it comes to the situation described by Jayasekara, there seems to be a considerable lack of coordination and healthy relationship between State Ministers and public officials, and also a lack of understanding among public officials about the State Minister’s powers and role. The lack of support extended by public officials when State Ministers issue instructions could also be an attitudinal issue, or Cabinet Ministers’ instructions against accepting State Ministers’ instructions. Regardless, this situation calls for immediate steps to repair this damaged, unclear and ineffective relationship between the Cabinet Ministers, the State Ministers and public officials. This process should involve a more open dialogue about the State Ministers’ roles, responsibilities and powers, and also proper coordination and consensus between Cabinet Ministers and State Ministers when it comes to taking decisions. Taking into account the above-mentioned situation concerning public officials, it can also be recommended to introduce a more transparent and coordinated mechanism when it comes to conveying Ministerial level decisions to public officials. 

At the same time, the necessity of having State Ministers should also be reassessed, and if the matter was actually taken into account by the President or even the Prime Minister, they should pay attention to it. In a context where successive Governments have used their powers in appointing Ministers rather carelessly, unscientifically and selfishly, often on the basis of political reasons, the Government should think carefully whether such a culture should and could continue in the current economic climate. In this context, an evaluation of what Ministries or subjects are genuinely in need of State Ministers and appointing State Ministers only for those will be highly beneficial, and will undoubtedly be welcomed by the public. At the same time, State Ministers who do not have anything considerable to contribute even if the obstacles flagged by Jayasekara are rectified should be removed from their positions and be appointed to positions in which they can be useful to the country.