Saturday 25th January, 2025

Inordinate delays in the Customs clearance of imported freight containers have angered importers and container truck operators beyond measure. About 30 ships have already skipped the Colombo Port owing to congestion. There seems to be no end in sight to the protracted delays and the resultant long queues of container trucks in areas like Orgugodawatte.

President Anura Kumara Dissanayake sought to remedy the situation by ordering the Customs to work 24/7, but to no avail. At a meeting chaired by him, the Customs bigwigs agreed to do as he said, but delays persist.

Worse, it has now been revealed that as many as 323 containers have been released without Customs inspection amidst delays. Deputy Minister of Ports and Civil Aviation Janith Ruwan Kodituwakku has reportedly said the government takes full responsibility for the containers so released.

He has said that due to congestion, some containers have to be processed via the green channel as it is not possible to inspect as many as 2,000 40-foot boxes individually on a daily basis. He has also said the aforesaid 323 containers were released under the supervision of a three-member committee.

Smugglers must be making the most of the unchecked release of shipping containers. Contraband goods are often found in containers brought in through the Colombo Port, which has also become a major entry point for narcotics, and therefore the government must reveal to the public who ordered the release of the aforesaid 323 containers without inspection, and what they carried.

One may recall that in 2013, more than 131 kilos of heroin were found in a shipping container, which a coordinating secretary to the then Prime Minister D. M. Jayaratne requested the Customs to clear on a priority basis. In July 2017, a consignment of cocaine weighing 218 kilos was detected in a container carrying sugar, at the Ratmalana Economic Centre. There have been numerous instances where Customs checks yielded huge amounts of dangerous drugs concealed in freight containers. Besides, Sri Lanka shipped back 263 containers filled with hospital waste to the UK; those banned items were imported in 2017 and 2019. This shows why no container should be released through the green channel.

The NPP government keeps on claiming that the current Customs delays have come about due to lapses on the part of the previous administrations, and new container yards will have to be built and the existing ones expanded to streamline the Customs clearance of imported containers.

True, the past governments were not blameless, but the current situation is due to the government’s failure to make the Customs fall in line. So, instead of trying to scapegoat its political rivals, the government must deal with the Customs with a firm hand.

It has chosen to kowtow to a cartel of wealthy rice millers and private bus operators despite its leaders’ braggadocio. The Customs are also defying government orders with impunity to all intents and purposes. Some importers have said that if the government plucks up the courage to confront the Customs, it will be able to streamline the release of containers within 48 hours.

Meanwhile, the irate container truck drivers who have to wait on the road for days on end, without access to sanitary facilities, etc., have threatened a strike. Their grievances are legitimate, and it is hoped that the government will address them.

Friday 24th January, 2025

The Ceylon Chamber of Coconut Industries (CCCI) has called upon the government to import 200 million coconuts immediately to meet a shortfall in the domestic supply. Otherwise, the prevailing coconut shortage will take a turn for the worse during the upcoming festive season, the CCCI has warned. Widely consumed varieties of rice are also in short supply, and their prices are soaring. Red rice has become as rare as a snowflake in summer. The government is all at sea, and when the shortages of rice and coconuts will be over is anybody’s guess. It is busy sorting out issues related to food served in the parliament restaurants, which never experience shortages.

Leader of the House and Minister Bimal Ratnayake announced the other day that the government would ensure that the prices of food sold in the parliament restaurants reflected the costs, and the MPs would have to pay as much as Rs. 3,000 for breakfast, lunch and tea a day. The government has made another about-turn; it has lowered the aforesaid amount to Rs. 2,000, according to media reports.

It was the Opposition that raised the issue of subsidised food in the parliament canteens. SJB MP Hesha Withana told a media briefing in November 2024 that he would bring in a motion seeking to do away with subsidised meals, allowances and loans for the MPs and to have the Madiwela MPs’ housing scheme turned into a university hostel. He did not fulfil that pledge. So, the government members alone cannot be blamed for ‘overpromising’ and ‘underdelivering’. Their Opposition counterparts are also all mouth and no trousers, so to speak.

Denying anyone the pleasure of gratifying his or her gastronomical desires amounts to a breach of ingrained cultural norms of hospitality and generosity cherished by Sri Lankans. But shouldn’t the elected people’s representatives, who come to power, promising to share in the economic hardships of the masses, be reminded that they must not feast on delectable victuals while the electors are struggling to dull the pangs of hunger? The MPs shed copious tears for the ordinary people skipping meals, and the children affected by malnutrition and resultant growth disorders. Isn’t it morally reprehensible for the elected to feast while the electors are starving?

Before last year’s presidential and parliamentary elections, the JVP/NPP politicians had the public believe that, if elected, they would not live in the MPs’ quarters at Madiwela or eat subsidised food in the parliament canteens; they also said they would travel in crowded buses and trains like the ordinary people. Those who voted for them may have expected them to do as they had done while they were in President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s UPFA government from 2004 to 2005. The JVP had 39 MPs in that administration, and some of them including Anura Kumara Dissanayake held Cabinet portfolios. They earned the admiration of the public for their simple living.

The NPP government’s promise to discontinue the practice of serving the MPs subsidised meals will resonate with the public who cannot even afford rice and coconuts. But proof of the pudding is said to be in the eating. One cannot decide whether food prices are actually cost-reflective in the parliament restaurants until one sees what the menus feature there.

The holier-than-thou NPP politicians are in overdrive, asking the former Presidents occupying state-owned houses to pay rents commensurate with the government valuation of those properties or vacate immediately. They say they are also planning to auction the vehicles used by politicians during the previous government. So, why can’t they close down the parliamentary restaurants and ask all MPs to brown-bag their lunches?

Thursday 23rd January, 2025

Donald Trump is no stranger to controversy, but his nonconsecutive second term is going to be even more controversial than the first one if some of the executive orders he signed immediately after being inaugurated as the 47th US President on Monday are any indication. He rescinded about 78 executive actions of his predecessor, Joe Biden. He ordered that the US withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO), causing much concern to the entire world. He levelled some unsubstantiated allegations against the WHO in a bid to justify his decision. One may recall that during his first term, the US withdrew from the United Nations Human Rights Council, which US envoy to the UN Nikki Haley called ‘a cesspool of political bias’.

President Trump issued another controversial executive order, granting a presidential pardon to about 1,500 Republican supporters serving jail terms for storming Capitol Hill on 06 Jan. 2021 in a bid to disrupt a joint session of the Congress convened to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election, where Trump lost to Biden. That blanket pardon came as a surprise even to some of Trump’s close associates. His sweeping approach to the issue is bound to be used by his critics to bolster their claim that the rioters acted at his behest in 2021. After all, Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives led by Democrats for ‘incitement of insurrection’, but he was subsequently acquitted by the Senate.

Trump’s controversial pardon for the Capitol Hill rioters came close on the heels of a much-publicised statement by Vice President J. D. Vance that those who had committed violence on 06 Jan., 2021 should not be pardoned. Ironically, during his second presidential election campaign, Trump stressed the need to restore the rule of law, and promised tough action against lawbreakers, but his first day in office saw the hard work done by the FBI, etc., in the Capitol Hill probe, which reportedly became known as the largest-ever criminal investigation in the US, being undone. Trump’s pardon will surely find its way into history books just like the one granted to the Confederate rebels after the conclusion of the Civil War.

The US never misses an opportunity to take the moral high ground and pontificate to the rest of the world on the virtues of democracy, the rule of law, justice, etc. Perhaps, what is more disturbing than Trump’s blanket pardon at issue is the fact that the US people ‘pardoned’ Trump, who mercilessly assailed the integrity of the US electoral process by challenging the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, brought the US into disrepute internationally, allegedly backed a riot that almost scuttled the certification by the Congress of the aforesaid election results, and, above all, was convicted of felony; they re-elected him President, enabling him to do more of what he drew much criticism for doing during his first term. Trump himself has been able to avoid punishment for felony thanks to his re-election. He received an ‘unconditional discharge’ from a New York court a few days before his inauguration.

President Biden granted a presidential pardon to his son, Hunter, who was to face sentencing on federal felony and tax convictions, last month, and went on to issue pre-emptive pardons for three of his siblings and two of their spouses, during the final minutes of his presidential term, claiming that they might be targets of ‘baseless and politically motivated investigations’. Those controversial pardons may have emboldened Trump to adopt a sweeping approach to the Capitol Hill riot issue.

Washington and Colombo are doubtlessly worlds apart, but one sees some striking similarities between the two cities where unfolding political scenarios are concerned. In Washington, a man who was accused of inciting an insurrection, which almost derailed the legislative certification of the outcome of a democratically conducted presidential election, in 2021, is now the US President. In Colombo, a political party, which has admitted to an abortive attempt to engineer a mob invasion of Parliament in 2022, is now in power, having secured the coveted executive presidency and obtained a two-thirds majority in Parliament. Some of the rioters have been elected to Parliament! Others who are facing legal action must be hoping for a blanket pardon.