- Says will cover many financial issues at the SLSEC/NEMO including sums owed to banks, contractors
The Sri Lanka State Engineering Corporation (SLSEC) denied media reports which claimed that it is going to sell a 17-acre land in Peliyagoda merely to pay the salaries of the employees at the SLSEC, stating that such would also cover many other financial issues within the Corporation, The Daily Morning learnt.
Speaking to The Daily Morning yesterday (21), the SLSEC Chairman Rathnasiri Kalupahana said that the said proposal was made not solely to cover the arrears of salaries and Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) contributions for employees in the Corporation and the National Equipment and Machinery Organisation (NEMO), but also to remedy many other financial issues existing in the SLSEC.
He also said that the said decision was taken as per the directions given by the Treasury when they requested funds to clear the arrears in employee salaries and other payments. “There are nearly 2,160 employees in the SLSEC and we spend Rs. 135-140 million per month to pay their salaries. Another Rs. 11 million is spent on paying salaries for the employees at the NEMO. For the last 60 years, we managed all our expenses solely by our income. But, with the recent economic crisis, that has proved impossible. Therefore, we sought help from the Treasury and support was denied. They also proposed to us to make an enterprise-based plan under which we proposed a voluntary retirement claiming scheme. The Treasury advised us to create funds by selling an asset of the SLSEC. That is how this proposal was made,” he said.
He said that apart from paying salaries and the arrears in the Employees Trust Fund and the EPF, the SLSEC has to pay around Rs. 2,000 million to the Bank of Ceylon and also a large sum to many contractors. Kalupahana also noted that a considerably small amount has to be allocated for paying salaries in comparison to the other financial issues faced by the SLSEC, and that therefore, it is untrue to claim that the SLSEC is to sell land just to pay the salaries of its employees.