Monday 20th January, 2025

The Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) has endeared itself to the people immensely by directing the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) to lower the power tariffs by an average of 20%. It was a case of Hobson’s choice for the NPP government, which insisted that a substantial electricity price reduction would not be possible within the next three years although it promised, before last year’s elections, to slash power tariffs by as much as 30% ‘in the near future’. The Opposition has mockingly asked whether ‘the near future’ is equal to three years.

The Opposition and some consumer rights groups have claimed the credit for the power tariff reduction. If they consider themselves so influential as to have power tariffs lowered, will they explain why they failed to have petroleum prices reduced?

True, the government only made a virtue of necessity by allowing the CEB to carry out the PUCSL decision on power tariff revision. If it had opted to do otherwise, the Opposition would have taken to the streets with the people joining it. But the fact remains that the NPP did not seek to railroad the PUCSL into doing its bidding. One may recall that the Rajapaksa-Wickremesinghe government prevented a downward power tariff revision by scuttling the PUCSL; it had some of the PUCSL members resign and removed its chairman by securing the passage of a motion in Parliament to that effect. The current administration did not do so despite having a two-thirds parliamentary majority. The Opposition says the government will strike back and smoke out the PUCSL members. It is hoped that the NPP will act prudently without providing its rivals with another rallying point.

The argument that the CEB should not be making profits at the expense of its consumers is tenable. The CEB has made huge profits. However, it has to repay its debts, and a fine balance needs to be struck between tariff reductions and debt repayment. Otherwise, it will be swings and roundabouts for electricity consumers, for the government will pass the cost of servicing the CEB’s debt on to the public in the form of tax increases. The proponents of power tariff reductions have chosen to gloss over this aspect of the issue for political reasons.

The NPP government finds itself in an unenviable position despite its mammoth electoral victory two months ago. The problem with raising the people’s expectations excessively is that a political party that captures power by doing so finds it extremely difficult to live up to them. The NPP resorted to sloganeering and made a host of promises as it was desperate to savour power. Its pre-election slogans, promises and demands are now boomeranging.

During their opposition days, the NPP/JVP leaders made fiery speeches tearing their political rivals to shreds and asking the SLPP-UNP government to slash taxes and tariffs and halve fuel prices forthwith; they insisted that all it would take to make rice freely available at affordable prices was a single stroke of the presidential pen; they condemned the Port City project as an environmental disaster sans any economic benefits to Sri Lanka; the NPP election manifesto promised biannual pay hikes for state employees among other things; it pledged to renegotiate the IMF programme, especially the Debt Sustainability Analysis; some former military officers who jumped on the NPP bandwagon promised to neutralise the netherworld of crime and narcotics in less than two months, and the NPP made a solemn pledge to have all the thieves of state assets thrown behind bars and recover the stolen funds posthaste.

Today, the NPP’s slogans, demands and unfulfilled promises, which are legion, have become grist for the Opposition’s mill. The government is dogged by its broken promises, which are likely to be its nemesis. Unfortunately, its confusion and incompetence have enabled a bunch of rogues who enriched themselves, ruined the economy and lost elections or skipped them for fear of defeat to crawl out of the woodwork and claw their way up.

Several decades ago, when the Food Drive led by Prime Minister Dudley Senanayake in a bold move to achieve self-sufficiency in essential foods wherever possible, the press officer in Mr. MD Banda’s Agriculture and Food Ministry, Lakshman Ratnapala telephoned several prominent personalities to get their views on the effort. One of them, the late Dr. EW Adikaram, the ascetic academic, told Ratnapala: “I can tell you what I think but you will not be able to publish my view.” The press officer urged “never mind, Sir, please tell me.” Adikaram’s reply: “I think we are already self-sufficient in rice because we eat twice as much as we need to!”

However that be, in the years since Dudley Senanayake’s Food Drive, we have heard boastful claims from many ministers that self-sufficiency in rice has been achieved. During Mr. EL Senanayake’s time as agriculture minister a cargo of rice was even exported to an African country. If the annual rice consumption of a population that has increased sharply over the years and the domestic production are compared, without doubt the self-sufficiency claim will be proved accurate. Yet we continue to often import rice to contend with a real or perceived shortages.

Our regular columnist Rajan Philips wrote on this page last Sunday of “Sri Lanka’s Perennial Rice Crisis: Scarcity Despite Self-Sufficiency” neatly summing up the existing situation. For the past several years, a so-called Mafia of large scale rice millers have been accused of hoarding and price manipulation to the detriment of both producer and consumer alike. Recent inspections have not been able to establish hoarding. Noises made by government on its commitment to end such practices have been all froth and no beer. Imposition of controlled prices have not worked with the available enforcement mechanism lacking the required muscle. Many traders refrained from stocking saying that selling at the declared maximum retail price (MRP) would mean losses.

Although government permitted rice imports, it imposes a high tax of Rs. 65 per kilo no doubt in an effort to safeguard producer interests rather than as a revenue raising measure. Finely balancing producer and consumer interests in determining the price of rice is a very difficult if not an impossible exercise. Recent and present shortages per se were not of rice itself but of certain varieties of rice, Nadu in particular. Red rice too was short in some areas, something the opposition seized on to say this affected the cooking of Pongal rice by Hindus to celebrate last week’s festival. The government countered by attributing the shortage to Ranil Wickremesinghe’s distribution of free red rice before the presidential election.

A variety of factors come into play in the availability and price of rice which is not only the country’s staple food but had also long been a staple of politics. For example there was a price incentive to produce keeri samba. When there was an over-supply of this variety, considered superior and therefore more expensive, some traders made the purchase of a quantity this variety a condition for selling cheaper rice. Whatever the recent convulsions regarding the prices and availability of rice, we were never confronted by a situation similar to the post-1970 crisis of the Sirima Bndaranaike-led United Front government when rice less days were mandated by law and haal pollas (rice barriers) erected to prevent the transport of paddy/rice across districts.

A factor that has contributed to the present problem has been the running down of the state-owned Paddy Marketing Board (PMB) and the fact that the PMB continues with outdated warehousing rather than using silos for grain storage like the big millers do. An effort to rehabilitate rundown PMB warehouse has now begun and hopefully the board will soon be effective in the market.

What’s in a name?

As readers are well aware, appreciations of people no longer alive, written by their friends and relatives are regular features in most newspapers. When very well know figures like former President Jimmy Carter of the USA and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India died recently, their obituaries were published not only in their own countries but also globally. In our paper last Sunday, Amal Jayasinghe, long time bureau chief in Colombo of the Agence France-Presse (AFP), wrote an appreciation of his father marking his seventh death anniversary.

This was no common or garden obituary. Using his considerable writing skills, the writer focused on his father’s names. Originally named Hirohito Edward Jayasinghe, these names were later replaced with Lenin Lindbergh with the subject living out his life as Lenin Jayasinghe. Lenin, though not common, was not totally unknown in then Ceylon and now Sri Lanka. If fact we even have a Joseph Stalin leading a teachers’ trade union and there have been more than one Hitler in this country. Also Shakespeare from Jaffna, a Bradman in the Ceylon Civil Service and elsewhere but no Mussolini we know of. Hirohito we have not heard before.

We all know the Solomon West Ridegeway (a British Governor General) Dias Bandaranaike though fewer would know that the name Solomon was carried by at least three generations of the Bandaranaikes with even Anura bearing that name. He was Anura Priyadhrshana Solomon Dias Bandaranaike. SWRD, apparently, was called “Solla” in close family circles. We also had Henry Woodward (famous principal of Mahinda College, Galle) Amarasuriya well know for his wealth and political role having been elected to parliament and served as a cabinet minister. The writer had a friend who named his daughter Romancita after a race horse – whether it was winner he backed we do not know.

Nicknames too are galore in schools and not only for teachers. There was a Yakadaya at royal College followed by his sibling Malakadaya!

Saturday 18th January, 2025

The JVP-led NPP asked for a working majority in Parliament to carry out what it called a clean-up campaign on the cards. Believing in its rhetoric, the people gave it a two-thirds majority instead. President Anura Kumara Dissanayake asked for mops and brooms for the grand clean-up, but the people gave him a bulldozer, so to speak. They did so because they wanted to strengthen his hands to overcome challenges and obstacles, upend the existing systems and serve their interests, but the government has not even been able to tame the millers’ cartel and private bus operators who have become a law unto themselves. It has even failed to make public officials fall in line.

Following a recent meeting between President Dissanayake and the Customs bigwigs, at the Presidential Secretariat, to discuss inordinate delays in container clearance, the government declared that the situation would be remedied in four days and the Customs would work 24/7. But that claim too has become a broken promise. Long lines of container trucks are still seen on the roads leading to the Orugodawatta terminal of the Customs.

Truckers have been struggling to gain access to food, water and sanitary facilities for days. They blamed the Customs for their suffering. One of them was heard saying on television yesterday that the people who had given President Dissanayake a huge mandate, expecting him to deal with errant state officials with a firm hand, felt badly let down. His view no doubt resonates with all others who backed the NPP overwhelmingly, hoping for a radical change.

Large-scale rice millers and private bus operators are running parallel governments to all intents and purposes; they scuttle the incumbent regime’s half-hearted attempts to control them. Even President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, a former battle-hardened frontline combat officer, dared not take on the wealthy rice millers, who are known to throw money around and have governments on a string. Today, the situation has become so bad that even state officials are defying presidential directives with impunity.

Customs clearance delays cause huge losses to importers, who pass them on to customers. It is the public who bears the cost of delays caused by the Customs. A spokesman for importers has said there has been no increase in the import volume of late, and therefore the Customs clearance delays are unpardonable. He has said delays cannot persist if the Customs are working 24/7 in keeping with their promise to President Dissanayake. Curiously, the government has not cared to find out whether the Customs have streamlined their clearance operations.

Shouldn’t the government be considerate enough to take action to provide the truckers who have been waiting in their vehicles for days, with mobile toilets, food and water until the Customs grandees eliminate delays?

Of what use is a government that cannot ever so much as make public officials carry out their duties and functions efficiently? Where are the cantankerous NPP ministers?