JAMES H LANEROLLE – a gentleman and administrator par excellence

Appreciation

It was saddening to read the passing away of Mr. James H Lanerolle on 2nd June, a gentleman and an administrator, par excellence, with superior managerial skills. I had the privilege of working with him when he was Secretary to the Ministry of Power and Energy, for nearly a decade, and I am personally aware of what was uppermost in his mind when he carried out his duties, and that was national interest, and maintaining the high standards of the Ceylon Civil Service. I am personally grateful to the guidance given to achieve success in the public service. When mentioning of national interest, above politics and other considerations, one incident comes to my mind. That was when the country faced a severe drought and a decision had to be made whether to impose a power cut or not. There were two factions in the Ceylon Electricity Board [CEB] – one, advocating to run the hydro power stations till the reservoirs run dry, expecting rains, and the other faction advocated a scheduled power cut as it was feared, the dirt and decayed trunks of trees would damage the turbines, which would be calamitous. Mr. Lanerolle was in favour of a power cut while, quite understandably, as a politician, Minister D.B.Wijethunga was not. Mr. Lanerolle explained his position that he is answerable to the President who had appointed him to advise and guide the Minister, to place the matter before him and get a ruling. A meeting was arranged with President J. R. Jayewardene, with engineers of the CEB, where I, too, was present, the matter was discussed in detail. After hearing both sides of the story, President Jayewardene, turned to Mr. Lanerolle and asked ‘ What’s your opinion James?’ Mr. Lanerolle’s reply was to resort to power shedding. President JRJ gave a nod and said, ‘Go, ahead’. Then we feverishly started working into the late night to prepare the schedule and a press release. The other issue worth mentioning is the fraudulent award of Gas Turbine and the FTZ Grid station tenders, where, on representations made, President Jayewardene removed the Minster and took over the Ministry for Power and Energy under him in addition to being the President. [This should be a lesson to our present-day secretaries to ministries]

I have with me a letter written by Mr. Lanerolle dated May. 18th, 2006, and I consider it appropriate to reproduce what he had stated to show to what extent he had helped the electricity and energy sectors.

“Very few people know the circumstances and the background of my own tenure of service as S/P&W and Chairman CEB. The circumstances which led me to point out to J. R. Jayewardene & R.Premadasa & D. B. Wijethunga and several others of the need for long term perspective planning in several areas including that of Power and Energy the appointment of the Energy Planning Committee by JRJ, the deliberations of the committee, the constitution by me of a Planning Group led by Dr. P.N.Fernando to do what little perspective planning could be done vis-à-vis P&E. My sponsorship of the Coal-Fired Thermal programme, with Carlo Fernando heading it, the head winds we began to run into from the Environmental lobby, etc., all that [if related] will be litany of the results of objective deliberations by professionals and regretfully they were subsequently not followed up into implementation – some delayed for years!

“The background which I myself had in Petroleum as one of the original group that planned out and implemented that state participation in Petroleum Import and Distribution and launching [as then General Manager of CPC] of petroleum exploration with the help of the compagnie Francaise de Petroles, the planning of Sri Lanka’s first [and so far the only] refinery [Sapugakanda] – all that of course stood me to good advantage in dealing with the problems of CEB. At that stage I was the only officer with experience in both sectors Petroleum and Power & Energy.”

That is all what I know of Mr. Lanerolle as Secretary to the Ministry for Power and Energy. He has held several high positions locally and also served in foreign missions and his contributions are immense which only a few may know.

To wind up let me quote poet H.W. Longfellow “A Psalm of Life”

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

When departing leave behind us

Footprints in the sands of time.

G.A.D.Sirimal

BORALESGANUWA