News

CPSL alleges AKD’s budget proposals technocratic continuity in populist garb

Published

6 months ago

2025/11/14

Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s 2026 Budget speech, while breaking symbolically from tradition, reveals a deeper continuity with neoliberal orthodoxy and IMF-aligned fiscal governance, the Communist Party said in a statement issued yesterday (13).

The text of the CPSL statement: “Beneath the rhetoric of “economic democracy” lies a technocratic document that prioritises lender confidence over public empowerment, and party consolidation over structural transformation.

The budget speech omits any serious analysis of the global and local economic context, particularly the imperialist financial architecture that continues to extract value from the Global South through debt, ISBs, and structural adjustment.

The speech is saturated with fiscal jargon and macroeconomic metrics, clearly aimed at multilateral institutions (IMF, WB, ADB) rather than the Sri Lankan public. This alienates the very people the NPP claims to represent.

Despite AKD’s purported Marxist credentials, there is no mention of imperialist exploitation, financialisation, or the deindustrialisation of the Global North that has shifted production (and debt burdens) to the Global South.

The threat of war, driven by imperialist attempts to reassert dominance through military means, is ignored, despite its direct implications for Sri Lanka’s geopolitical and economic stability.

The budget introduces US dollar–denominated local bonds, ostensibly to absorb excess forex liquidity in local banks. This adds to the external debt burden and exposes the country to additional currency risk. Debt repayments already consume nearly two-thirds of recurrent expenditure, yet the government boasts of Rs 1 trillion in “savings”—a misleading claim, as one-third of this is invested in high-interest treasury bills, effectively indebting the state to itself.

Crucially, the debt repayment projections presented in the budget need to be re-examined. For instance, Sri Lanka’s interest and capital repayment obligations in 2028 pertaining to International Sovereign Bonds (ISBs) alone amount to approximately USD 935 million. Even if the foreign debt stock remains unchanged at 2025 levels, this sum will still be required to service interest and partial principal repayment on the so-called “Past Due Interest (PDI) bond.” This reality raises serious questions about the President’s recent assurances that there is “nothing to worry about” regarding future debt payments.

If the government indeed refrains from any new borrowing in 2026—even from development partners such as the ADB or World Bank—such a repayment trajectory would imply a self-imposed austerity of unprecedented magnitude. On the other hand, if the government proceeds with plans to raise roughly USD 300 million domestically in 2026, interest payments alone—at an estimated 7%—would add a further USD 21 million to the 2028 repayment bill. None of this appears to be reflected in the President’s confident assertion that “we will pay.” The statement, while politically soothing, conceals the structural fragility of Sri Lanka’s debt position and the contradiction between the rhetoric of fiscal sovereignty and the arithmetic of debt servicing.

On the other hand, the so-called “savings” are not being used to address urgent public needs—such as shortages of insulin, HIV, TB, Malaria and other drugs and crucial health requirements for hospitals—but are instead earmarked for importing 1,775 double cab vehicles for NPP officials. These tenders were issued even before the budget was passed, and the vehicles will be paid for in scarce foreign exchange.

The one ostensible “plus” in the budget is increased revenue through taxation. However, this is largely driven by import duties and sales tax on vehicles, which deplete foreign reserves.

A key revenue measure is the lowering of the VAT threshold from Rs 60 million to Rs 36 million, dragging small and medium enterprises (SMEs) – such as garages, bakeries, furniture shops – into the 18% VAT net.

SMEs employ over 90% of the workforce. This move will force many to shut down or pass the tax burden onto consumers, exacerbating unemployment and the cost of living for the poor and middle class.

The increase in plantation wages is a welcome step, but it is funded through state subsidies, not by compelling plantation companies to pay fair wages. This increases fiscal pressure without addressing corporate accountability.

The Rs 25 billion poverty eradication allocation is grossly inadequate. Based on World Bank poverty metrics and census data, this translates to just Rs 4,600 per person in extreme poverty.

The budget fails to integrate this with land reform, which remains the most effective tool for rural poverty alleviation. Instead, the Land Use Policy Plan prioritizes land release for private investors, sidelining the 81% of the multidimensionally poor who live in rural areas.

The budget promises 3,000 new projects in 2026, echoing Mahinda Rajapaksa’s post-war construction boom. But unlike 2009–2014, today’s bureaucracy is inert, and there has been no significant project rollout since AKD took office.

The proposed 5% medium-term growth rate is mathematically implausible. Achieving it would require investment to rise from 27% to 37–38% of GDP, with the private sector contributing 89% of that—an unrealistic expectation given current economic condition.

Public investment remains at a paltry 4% of GDP, undermining any serious growth strategy.

The budget’s vision of Sri Lanka as a “hub for data centres” is untethered from reality. Data centres require massive, uninterrupted electricity and water supplies, none of which are addressed in the budget’s infrastructure allocations. Without a parallel investment in energy and digital infrastructure, this proposal remains a hollow slogan.

NPP’s 2026 budget is a document of contradictions: technocratic in tone, populist in optics, and neoliberal in substance. It fails to challenge the global structures that perpetuate Sri Lanka’s dependency, while deepening domestic inequality through regressive taxation and elite-focused expenditure. The absence of a coherent development strategy, land reform, or industrial policy reveals a government more concerned with managing crisis optics than transforming structural realities.

All News Advertisement

News

Govt. assures UN of readiness to introduce ‘vetting process’ for troops on overseas missions

Published

10 hours ago

2026/04/28

Sahan Weerasooriya

Thuyakontha

Defence Secretary (retd.) Air Marshal Sampath Thuyakontha has discussed with UN officials in New York the deployment of Sri Lankan troops in Haiti, under a new UN authorised force, tasked with tackling heavily armed gangs operating in the violence ravaged country.

The UN is in the process of building up a force comprising approximately 5,500 officers and men for deployment in Haiti.

The Sri Lankan delegation included Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the UN, former Chief Justice Jayantha Jayasuriya. The UN has tagged the deployment Gang Suppression Force (GSF).

According to the Defence Ministry, Sri Lanka negotiated a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) regarding the GSF. Although Sri Lanka has contributed to UN-led missions, the proposed deployment differed due to the nature of the operation, sources told The Island.

The delegation has assured that all personnel, assigned for UN missions, including the proposed GSF deployment in Haiti, would be subjected to a comprehensive screening process, in line with UN standards. War-winning Sri Lanka has declared, in New York, that the country was in the process of developing, what the Defence Ministry here called, National Human Rights Vetting Mechanism in consultation with the UN Resident Coordinator in Colombo.

The US has backed the deployment of Sri Lankan troops under UN command. Various interested parties, over the years, protested against the deployment of Sri Lankan troops on the basis of unsubstantiated war crimes allegations.

Thuyakontha has assured that troops would maintain highest standards of discipline during overseas missions. Sri Lanka brought the war here to a successful conclusion in May 2009 against predictions of contrary outcome by so-called experts.

The US and Panama proposed the GSF to replace a Kenya-led multinational force undermined by a lack of funding. Its strength hovered around 1,000, rather than the desired 2,500. The U.N. Security Council authorised the 5,500 strong force on September 30, 2025, with the new power to arrest gang members.

By Shamindra Ferdinando

News

Lawyers cannot be denied right to represent a suspect – Udaya

Published

10 hours ago

2026/04/28

Sahan Weerasooriya

Sallay

Sallay’s case:

Attorney-at-law Udaya Gammanpila yesterday (27) said a lawyer could not be deprived of his or her right to represent a client.

The former Minister and leader of Pivuthuru Hela Urumaya (PHU) Gammanpila said so addressing the media at the party headoffice at Pita Kotte. Gammanpila was responding to recent media reports that he had been prohibited from representing retired State Intelligence Service (SIS) Chief Maj. Gen. Suresh Sallay. Therefore, there was absolutely no basis for claims that he had been barred from meeting the retired officer, now named the third suspect in the Easter Sunday case, the ex-parliamentarian said.

Gammanpila emphasised that in terms of the Constitution a suspect’s right to be represented by a lawyer was recognised as a fundamental right. The Criminal procedure Code, too, guaranteed the suspect’s right to consult a lawyer, the ex-lawmaker said, pointing out that the Judicial Organisation Act underscored the same.

Declaring that the retired officer’s wife had named him as Sallay’s lawyer in a letter addressed to Director, CID, Gammanpila said that the courts, police and the Attorney General’s Department couldn’t under any circumstances interfere with his right to represent Sallay.

The CID arrested Sallay on 25 February and detained him under Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) for a period of 90 days. Sallay has filed a writ petition before the Court of Appeal through his lawyers, challenging his arrest and detention by the CID under the PTA.

Former Minister Gammanpila said that even if a Magistrate had the power to prohibit a lawyer from representing a particular suspect, such a course of action couldn’t be resorted to without giving the lawyer concern an opportunity to explain his/her actions.

Declaring that in case of misconduct on the part of a lawyer only the Supreme Court could take disciplinary action, the PHU leader said, adding that he sought a certified copy of the proceedings of the day when a section of the media reported the Magistrate’s declaration of the purported ban. Gammapila said that he was really keen to know what happened during the proceedings on that day.

Sallay served as Director, Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI) from 2012 to 2016 and received the appointment as head of SIS following the 2019 presidential election. Sallay held that appointment till early October, 2024.

Gammanpila said that he couldn’t be barred for speaking to the media after meeting Sallay, currently held under PTA, or for authoring a book on the 2019 Easter Sunday carnage. According to Gammanpila as long as the suspect had no objections to his lawyer sharing some information with the media it shouldn’t be an issue for Additional Solicitor General Dileepa Peiris.

By Shamindra Ferdinando

News

Police seek Interpol help to probe monks nabbed with narcotics at BIA

Published

10 hours ago

2026/04/28

Sahan Weerasooriya

Police investigating the thwarted a bid made by 22 Buddhist monks to smuggle in narcotics, with a street value of Rs 660 mn via BIA, from Thailand, over the weekend, believe the monks who organised the clandestine operation had sent groups of monks to Thailand before.

Sources said that they had brought in narcotics on earlier occasions.

Police have seized the mobile phones used by the suspects and sought INTERPOL assistance.

Earlier, the Negombo Magistrate’s Court remanded those 22 monks, arrested in connection with the largest drug bust in the airport’s history.

The monks were produced before the Negombo Magistrate’s Court and ordered to be held in custody until 02 May, as investigations continue into the alleged smuggling operation and any wider networks involved.

However, other sources said that more than 110 kilogrammes of suspected Kush and Hashish, with an estimated street value exceeding Rs 1.1 billion, had been found, concealed in false-bottoms of their suitcases. The bags reportedly packed with school supplies and sweets are said to have contained over five kilogrammes of narcotics per individual.

The arrests followed a raid by the Police Narcotics Bureau on Saturday night. Investigators have also recovered mobile phone evidence indicating that the group had travelled to Bangkok on 22 April using airline tickets allegedly given by a sponsor. Authorities allege that the suspects were photographed in civilian clothing, while overseas, engaging in activities deemed suspicious.

Police say this marks the first reported instance of a large-scale narcotics operation via the airport involving Buddhist monks. The suspects are young monks from different parts of the country.

By Norman Palihawadana