We can begin the new year with some good news. A recent survey undertaken by a university has shown that there is a significant recovery of public confidence, particularly after basic services were resumed. The survey shows the importance of the availability of gas, fuel, fertiliser, and basic food items.
Fortunately, dollars earmarked by the ADB, World Bank, and bilateral donors like USAID for Sri Lankan projects could be transferred to fund immediate needs like gas and fertiliser. Also, savings by defaulting and not honouring last year’s debt payment freed up some dollars as a short-term measure.
Earnings from tourism and foreign remittances showed an improvement, allowing the setting aside of funds for oil purchases. The torrential rains also helped in the filling of reservoirs so that the generation of more hydropower became feasible. We would have had an even better prospect if the Power Ministry got its act together. The Minister, CEB engineers and workers, and the regulatory agency are working at cross purposes, giving an impression of uncertainty to that key Ministry.
The shortage of fertiliser, which led to the first attack on the management of GR and Mahindananda Aluthgamage, has now been arrested with money provided by the US. Minister Mahindananda and US Ambassador Julie Chung are now regular visitors to the port to face the cameras with sacks of fertiliser in the background.
President RW is in his element visiting the outstations and imparting his doctrine of concord and forgiveness as befitting the Christmas season. He can look back on a year well spent in which, as the Sinhala saying goes, he can ‘show sand and call it gold’. He has bowled googly after googly to defer the appointment of a new cabinet. The country, as the survey shows, is with him on that score. So let us wish ourselves a happy new year.
MEDICINE MAN
The country had just recovered from UNP Advisor Ashu Marasinghe’s dog days, which has affected the elephant party pretty badly, when Health Minister Rambukwella enjoyed a fully-funded [without the cost of his ticket, he now says] tour of India to visit the facilities of an Indian drug manufacturer who has tendered for the sale of his products to the medical authorities. It is another blatant instance of ‘tender loving care’ provided by several of our ministers to bidders.
The media is asking whether the President has approved of this voyage of discovery. In the past no minister could travel abroad without the PM’s authority and a temporary appointment was also made for a deputy minister to act during the minister’s absence. It will be interesting to know whether any such appointment was made.
Nor is this all. According to reports, the Indian company involved is still in competition for a tender to supply our medical authority. The Minister’s interference can be challenged in court. It could be the last straw for RW’s tottering regime.
VIETNAM
A leader of the JVP, Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa is speaking out on economic matters. Earlier he had said in public that private universities were welcome and the JVP would not oppose them. This however has not been confirmed by other leaders.
Last week on a TV talk show, he dropped another bombshell. He held up Vietnam’s economic policies as a model for the JVP. Vietnam is a communist country, yet it has tailored a policy of economic growth which is linked to foreign investment and is more open than even China. At the same time, JVP leaders like AKD are railing against the ‘sale’ of national assets.
It is the job of local media to inform the country about the growth strategies advocated by the JVP. At present no such document is forthcoming and the country which admires AKD’s forthright denunciation of corruption and family bandyism in high places will be disappointed if he cannot address the all-important economic question. If, as they now imagine, the influx of remittances from our workers abroad will be sufficient foreign investment, nobody will take them seriously.
BUDDHIST AND PALI UNIVERSITY
The stalemate at the B and P University continues, with the young monks openly following the Peratugami line. They have been demonstrating in the city but the authorities quite rightly want to clean up the university before it is restarted. Some have suggested that it should only be a university for monks. This shows a basic flaw in the recruitment of students to this university for which the education authorities are to be blamed.
The problem was that there were not enough eligible students in Pali studies for the university to function, so to overcome this lacuna, they willy-nilly recruited students from those who had failed to enter a university according to their Z-score but had offered Pali as a subject at the entrance examination. It is clear that most of the troublesome monks were only entering a university by the back door since they had failed to get into another university for lack of sufficient marks.
The answer must be to change the scheme of admission to include genuine scholars and not bystanders who want any degree so that they can secure a comfortable job. What a terrible finale for the vision of scholar monk Walpola Rahula to create a fraternity of educated Buddhist monks who could take the Buddha’s teaching to the world.
QUOTABLE QUOTE
“A friend bought me my ticket to India as my credit card was ineffective. I reimbursed him later” – Minister Keheliya Rambukwella. Ha Ha Ha.