News
Make merry and let country pay with another spike
by Rathindra Kuruwita
Some members of the public acted irresponsibly over the weekend and that such behaviour could soon lead to a spike in COVID-19, Deputy Director General of Health Services, Dr. Hemantha Herath told The Island yesterday.
“We saw how people were behaving over the weekend. They went on trips and are having parties. This is extremely irresponsible and shocking. There are close to 600 cases being reported in the country on a daily basis still. We saw similar irresponsible behaviour a few months back and we had to pay a price,” he said.
Dr. Herath urged the public to act responsibly in the coming holidays. Since the lockdown was lifted people had let their guard down and this might have serious consequences in the coming weeks, he said.
Meanwhile, head of the Public Health Inspectors Union (PHIU), Upul Rohana said that there was reason to believe that asymptomatic cases were on the rise. The successful vaccination drive had strengthened the immunity of healthy people and most of those people were not showing symptoms.
“This is how things start. They can transmit the disease to people who are elderly or not that healthy. Only then do things start going wrong. The government must do random testing around the country to identify the situation at the grassroots and take action before things go bad. People have lowered their guard and there is a lot of irresponsible behaviour,” he said.
The police have turned back 899 vehicles and over 1,500 people who had attempted to cross provinces without authorization in the past few days.
By AJA Abeynayake
The Attorney General informed the Supreme Court on Thursday (27) that Rs. 245 million from the funds obtained from the respondents, as per the verdict delivered on 12 January 2023 by a seven-judge bench led by the Chief Justice, had been paid as compensation to the victims of the Easter Sunday attacks. The case stemmed from fundamental rights petitions filed against the respondents’ failure to prevent the coordinated attacks. To monitor the disbursement of these funds, 13 related fundamental rights petitions were taken up on Thursday before a three-judge bench comprising Chief Justice Murdu Fernando, Justices S. Thurairaja, and A.H.M.D. Nawaz. Representing the Attorney General, Additional Solicitor General Viveka Siriwardena informed the court that Rs. 311 million had been allocated for compensation, of which Rs. 245 million had already been distributed among 412 individuals, including the families of 215 deceased victims.
She further stated that Rs. 65 million from the allocated funds was expected to be used for victims’ medical treatment and for the care of affected elderly individuals.
President’s Counsel Shamil Perera and Sanjeeva Jayawardena, appearing on behalf of Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo, and the Bar Association of Sri Lanka, respectively, told the court that they had not yet received detailed reports on the compensation payments.
Chief Justice Fernando asked the Additional Solicitor General why those reports had not been provided to the relevant parties. The Additional Solicitor General responded that the proceedings were focused on monitoring the disbursement of compensation to victims.
The Chief Justice, however, noted that withholding those reports from the petitioners did not align with the objectives of the case. She ordered that the reports be immediately provided to the Cardinal and the other petitioners.The court scheduled the next hearing of the petitions for 21 May.
…. Gnanakka also received Rs. 28 mn
Chief Government Whip Minister Nalinda Jayathissa said on Thursday that the Ranil Wickremesinghe government had spent an additional Rs. 1,125 million as compensation for individuals whose houses were destroyed in 2022.
That was in addition to the Rs. 1,221 million paid to politicians as compensation, Minister Jayatissa said, revealing that an astrologer called Gnanakka from Anuradhapura had received Rs. 28 million in compensation for her Devalaya destroyed by mobs in 2022. (SI)
By Saman Indrajith
During yesterday’s parliamentary session, Prime Minister Dr. Harini Amarasuriya disclosed the expenditure incurred by the state on foreign trips undertaken by Sri Lanka’s Presidents.
Mahinda Rajapaksa’s foreign trips between 2010 and 2014 cost Rs 3,572 million. His successor, Maithripala Sirisena spent Rs 384 million on overseas travel from 2015 to 2019. Gotabaya Rajapaksa spent Rs. 126 million from 2019 to 2022, while President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s foreign travel between 2023 and 2024 cost the state Rs 533 million.
In contrast, the current president, Anura Kumara Dissanayake, had spent only Rs 1.8 million on foreign travel since assuming office in September 2024, the PM said.
The Prime Minister highlighted that the most expensive year for presidential foreign travel during that period was 2013, when Mahinda Rajapaksa’s trips alone amounted to an unprecedented Rs 1,144 million.
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