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Impediments to a better CEB

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by Kumar David

It is a shame that CEB Chairman Vijitha Herath was happy to sell his professionals down the river for cheap popularity with his political bosses as in his interview in Ceylon Today (23 August, pA4). The sub-heading was “Corrupt Power Deals by last regime – CEB Chairman” and the opening summary statement by the interviewer reads “The power and energy sector in Sri Lanka, mainly the Ceylon Electricity Board is alleged to be one of the most corrupt and most negligent entities in the country. In the past even the state sector worked with the power sector in the most lackadaisical manner – cancelling competitive tenders and at the same time awarding them to those who curry favour with higher ups or private suppliers based on deals. There are accusations that CEB Engineers run a monopoly”. To my knowledge Mr Herath has issued no refutation disassociating himself from the interviewer’s implied attribution of views, nor has he rejected the association of his name and office from grossly untruthful slanders of his staff. Is this the man who is going to give leadership to the CEB? Does he not know that corruption in the power sector derives 90% from Presidents, the Cabinet, Power Ministers and Ministry Secretaries? Big time corruption in the power sector commenced in the 1990s in Chandrika’s time with the awarding of contracts to build and operate private power plants. Big money went to big players. Do they not teach corporate managers like Mr Herath about reciprocal confidence building? Managers who undermine and untruthfully publicly ridicule their staff will lose the trust of colleagues and the confidence of the institution.

In the mean time we have had this eight-hour all-Island blackout and an inability to restore full supplies for four or five days. One matter I want to especially complain about is the failure of the CEB or CEB-Ministry (erroneously named Power-Ministry) to issue a full, frank and transparent public statement. I appreciate detailed technical analyses will take time and highly placed fools who allege sabotage are doing damage. However, a simple summary would have sufficed to keep speculation at bay. Speculation on the grapevine says that a bus-bar was inadvertently energised by maintenance crew before a heavy earthing chain was removed which led to massive tripping of other circuits and the isolation of Norochcholai. After that it took ages to restart Norochcholai, a known problem which seems not to have been sorted out for 12 years.

Furthermore, there was something new that has not been encountered before. When units were brought back on-line and attempts made, in many different ways, to re-energise Colombo, the system repeatedly tripped. Is all this true? No official statement! Questions: (a) Three-phase to ground flashovers are not common but not unknown; systems should be robust to such events. (b) Why has something not been done for a decade about Norochcholai restarting? And (c) Repetitive tripping-on-re-energisation is a new phenomenon that CEB professionals can sort out given time. However, there has to be stringent outside review of their analyses and proposed solutions. Ministers who smell a saboteur-rat under every bed and Chairmen who undercut their staff will be of no help.

 

Renewable Energy

 

Renewable energy sourced technologies for the generation of electricity is one of the very best things that has happened to humanity. The problem is that the God Indira who commands the sun and wind was not equally generous to all corners of the earth. A one square kilometre site atop the Atacama Desert in Chile or Hardup in the Namib Dessert will produce about 350 GWh (gigawatt hours) and 230 GWh respectively per year. The output for a one square kilometre site in Puttalam, NCP, NP or Hambabtota will be about 150 GWh per year. [A GWh is 1,000,000 units or kWh]. A 1000MW coal power station will generate about 6300 GWh per year (Norochcholai is 900MW and extension to 1200 is planned). To match this, we will need 42 square kilometres of land, that is close to 10,000 acres! This is the problem! Only countries with large dessert landmasses can think big about solar powered electricity. Uninhabited and uncultivated portions NCP, NWP, NP and Hambantota District are good locations for big solar farms, but all together it will not be easy to put together more than about half-a-Norochcholai. As with big-hydro, with wind and solar too, once the best sites are used up it’s saturation; what after that? With other technologies (thermal, nuclear and future fusion power) new plant can be added without such restrictions.

An attraction of solar power is that prices are coming down steeply. After you factor in lifetime repayment of capital, the future cost of electricity generated from large solar farms will be about Rs 10 per kWh while coal or LNG cost between Rs 7 and Rs 9 depending on global coal and gas prices. Let us agree, prices are comparable. The CEB buys privately generated (IPP or Independent Power Producer) power, when it faces shortage, at about Rs 25 per kWh, again variable with world oil prices. [I won’t waste your time with fractions and decimals which will be out of date between one month and the next. When someone with a little subject knowledge writes media columns the duty is to convey useful and reliable information, not to impress readers with minutiae].

We are in our present predicament because of the stupidity and inanity, respectively, of President Sirisena and PM Ranil who ignored an Expert Committee Report in 2016 which warned that cancelling Sampur coal-fired power station would be ruinous. They had numerous warnings from other experts and CEB planners as well. As a member of the Committee I estimated, and included in the Report, that this blunder would cost the country Rs 220 billion. That now seems a bit of an underestimate and the crisis has arrived sooner than I forecast. I am not playing the usual “this regime”, “that regime” game that the media, corporate chairmen and politician are slick at. The two former Rajapaksa Administrations and the 2015-2019 government have all been grossly imprudent in respect of the long and short-term future of the country’s electricity sector. That’s that and QED!

I will not repeat the same story about wind generated electricity though I have jotted down some back of the envelope calculations for my own use. The scenario is similar to solar: It is, like solar, much less polluting and it is price comparable with coal or LNG and much less pricey (only capital costs, negligible running cost) than oil-fired private power. But availability of good sites is limited as with solar (once the best sites are used up as with major hydro, the story is finished – what to do after that?). A very important point is that renewables are big in the public popularity stakes and this is the great selling point for politicians who don’t know the difference between a kilowatt-hour and an LED lamp.

As per the most up to date information on the CEB website (2017) large-hydro supplied 24.6% of total energy while wind, mini-hydro and solar supplied 8.1% – of which mini-hydro was 5.2% all the others 3.9%. CEB thermal (coal and oil) was 52.2% and IPPs (all oil) 15.2% of energy. (It fluctuates a little annually depending on rainfall and unforeseen events like the August 2020 system outage). However, one needs to be ignorant of the basic laws of physics and not schooled in primary arithmetic to say that renewable source electricity will supply 80% of energy by 2030. If in 10 to 15 years demand doubles (say) and no large-hydro is added (only few medium-size projects are left to do) then its relative share will decline, as per trivial arithmetic, to 12.3%. To increase non large-hydro renewables (only 3.9% now) by a factor of five to 19.5%, energy supply must increase, as per trivial arithmetic again, tenfold within 10 years! Only knaves and politicians make such promises.

Has government (President/PM/Cabinet/Subject Ministry) corruption and incompetence been an obstacle to the faster implementation of renewable energy sourced electricity? When competent, rational and honest decision making about the country’s long-term generation expansion programme is undermined by government (all governments) it throws a spanner in the works. Government after government have been ‘playing pandu’; to-LNG or not-to-LNG; to have another coal fired unit or not; to embrace India or Japan or both. When mega private sector companies screw ministers and when nothing is decided properly, it throws the transmission plans out of kilter and demoralises planners. It stands funding including for renewable sources on its head. Therefore, in addition to the technical limitations that I discussed previously cock-up and corruption at the highest levels – not in the CEB Mr Herath but in governments – is an impediment to a sensible programme for increasing renewable source power generation.

 

 



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A plural society requires plural governance

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The local government elections that took place last week saw a consolidation of the democratic system in the country.  The government followed the rules of elections to a greater extent than its recent predecessors some of whom continue to be active on the political stage.  Particularly noteworthy was the absence of the large-scale abuse of state resources, both media and financial, which had become normalised under successive governments in the past four decades.  Reports by independent election monitoring organisations made mention of this improvement in the country’s democratic culture.

In a world where democracy is under siege even in long-established democracies, Sri Lanka’s improvement in electoral integrity is cause for optimism. It also offers a reminder that democracy is always a work in progress, ever vulnerable to erosion and needs to be constantly fought for. The strengthening of faith in democracy as a result of these elections is encouraging.  The satisfaction expressed by the political parties that contested the elections is a sign that democracy in Sri Lanka is strong.  Most of them saw some improvement in their positions from which they took reassurance about their respective futures.

The local government elections also confirmed that the NPP and its core comprising the JVP are no longer at the fringes of the polity.  The NPP has established itself as a mainstream party with an all-island presence, and remarkably so to a greater extent than any other political party.  This was seen at the general elections, where the NPP won a majority of seats in 21 of the country’s 22 electoral districts. This was a feat no other political party has ever done. This is also a success that is challenging to replicate. At the present local government elections, the NPP was successful in retaining its all-island presence although not to the same degree.

Consolidating Support

Much attention has been given to the relative decline in the ruling party’s vote share from the 61 percent it secured in December’s general election to 43 percent in the local elections. This slippage has been interpreted by some as a sign of waning popularity. However, such a reading overlooks the broader trajectory of political change. Just three years ago, the NPP and its allied parties polled less than five percent nationally. That they now command over 40 percent of the vote represents a profound transformation in voter preferences and political culture. What is even more significant is the stability of this support base, which now surpasses that of any rival. The votes obtained by the NPP at these elections were double those of its nearest rival.

The electoral outcomes in the north and east, which were largely won by parties representing the Tamil and Muslim communities, is a warning signal that ethnic conflict lurks beneath the surface. The success of the minority parties signals the different needs and aspirations of the ethnic and religious minority electorates, and the need for the government to engage more fully with them.  Apart from the problems of poverty, lack of development, inadequate access to economic resources and antipathy to excessive corruption that people of the north and east share in common with those in other parts of the country, they also have special problems that other sections of the population do not have. These would include problems of military takeover of their lands, missing persons and persons incarcerated for long periods either without trial or convictions under the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (which permits confessions made to security forces to be made admissible for purposes of conviction) and the long time quest for self-rule in the areas of their predominance

The government’s failure to address these longstanding issues with urgency appears to have caused disaffection in electorate in the north and east. While structural change is necessarily complex and slow, delays can be misinterpreted as disinterest or disregard, especially by minorities already accustomed to marginalisation. The lack of visible progress on issues central to minority communities fosters a sense of exclusion and deepens political divides. Even so, it is worth noting that the NPP’s vote in the north and east was not insignificant. It came despite the NPP not tailoring its message to ethnic grievances. The NPP has presented a vision of national reform grounded in shared values of justice, accountability, development, and equality.

Translating electoral gains into meaningful governance will require more than slogans. The failure to swiftly address matters deemed to be important by the people of those areas appears to have cost the NPP votes amongst the ethnic and religious minorities, but even here it is necessary to keep matters in perspective.  The NPP came first in terms of seats won in two of the seven electoral districts of the north and east.  They came second in five others. The fact that the NPP continued to win significant support indicates that its approach of equity in development and equal rights for all has resonance. This was despite the Tamil and Muslim parties making appeals to the electorate on nationalist or ethnic grounds.

Slow Change

Whether in the north and east or outside it, the government is perceived to be slow in delivering on its promises.  In the context of the promise of system change, it can be appreciated that such a change will be resisted tooth and nail by those with vested interests in the continuation of the old system.  System change will invariably be resisted at multiple levels.  The problem is that the slow pace of change may be seen by ethnic and religious minorities as being due to the disregard of their interests.  However, the system change is coming slow not only in the north and east, but also in the entire country.

At the general election in December last year, the NPP won an unprecedented number of parliamentary seats in both the country as well as in the north and east.  But it has still to make use of its 2/3 majority to make the changes that its super majority permits it to do.  With control of 267 out of 339 local councils, but without outright majorities in most, it must now engage in coalition-building and consensus-seeking if it wishes to govern at the local level. This will be a challenge for a party whose identity has long been built on principled opposition to elite patronage, corruption and abuse of power rather than to governance. General Secretary of the JVP, Tilvin Silva, has signaled a reluctance to form alliances with discredited parties but has expressed openness to working with independent candidates who share the party’s values. This position can and should be extended, especially in the north and east, to include political formations that represent minority communities and have remained outside the tainted mainstream.

In a plural and multi-ethnic society like Sri Lanka, democratic legitimacy and effective governance requires coalition-building. By engaging with locally legitimate minority parties, especially in the north and east, the NPP can engage in principled governance without compromising its core values. This needs to be extended to the local government authorities in the rest of the country as well. As the 19th century English political philosopher John Stuart Mill observed, “The worth of a state in the long run is the worth of the individuals composing it,” and in plural societies, that worth can only be realised through inclusive decision-making.

by Jehan Perera

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Commercialising research in Sri Lanka – not really the healthiest thing for research

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Image credit University of Sydney

In the early 2000s, a colleague, returning to Sri Lanka after a decade in a research-heavy first world university, complained to me that ‘there is no research culture in Sri Lanka’. But what exactly does having a ‘research culture’ mean? Is a lot of funding enough? What else has stopped us from working towards a productive and meaningful research culture? A concerted effort has been made to improve the research culture of state universities, though there are debates about how healthy such practices are (there is not much consideration of the same in private ‘universities’ in Sri Lanka but that is a discussion for another time). So, in the 25 years since my colleague bemoaned our situation, what has been happening?

What is a ‘research culture’?

A good research culture would be one where we – academics and students – have the resources to engage productively in research. This would mean infrastructure, training, wholesome mentoring, and that abstract thing called headspace. In a previous Kuppi column, I explained at length some of the issues we face as researchers in Sri Lankan universities, including outdated administrative regulations, poor financial resources, and such aspects. My perspective is from the social sciences, and might be different to other disciplines. Still, I feel that there are at least a few major problems that we all face.

Number one: Money is important.

Take the example American universities. Harvard University, according to Harvard Magazine, “received $686.5 million in federally sponsored research grants” for the fiscal year of 2024 but suddenly find themselves in a bind because of such funds being held back. Research funds in these universities typically goes towards building and maintenance of research labs and institutions, costs of equipment, material and other resources and stipends for graduate and other research assistants, conferences, etc. Without such an infusion of money towards research, the USA would not have been able to attracts (and keeps) the talent and brains of other countries. Without a large amount of money dedicated for research, Sri Lankan state universities, too, will not have the research culture it yearns for. Given the country’s austere economic situation, in the last several years, research funds have come mainly from self-generated funds and treasury funds. Yet, even when research funds are available (they are usually inadequate), we still have some additional problems.

Number two: Unending spools of red tape

In Sri Lankan universities red tape is endless. An MoU with a foreign research institution takes at least a year. Financial regulations surrounding the award and spending of research grants is frustrating.

Here’s a personal anecdote. In 2018, I applied for a small research grant from my university. Several months later, I was told I had been awarded it. It comes to me in installments of not more than Rs 100,000. To receive this installment, I must submit a voucher and wait a few weeks until it passes through various offices and gains various approvals. For mysterious financial reasons, asking for reimbursements is discouraged. Obviously then, if I were working on a time-sensitive study or if I needed a larger amount of money for equipment or research material, I would not be able to use this grant. MY research assistants, transcribers, etc., must be willing to wait for their payments until I receive this advance. In 2022, when I received a second advance, the red tape was even tighter. I was asked to spend the funds and settle accounts – within three weeks. ‘Should I ask my research assistants to do the work and wait a few weeks or months for payment? Or should I ask them not to do work until I get the advance and then finish it within three weeks so I can settle this advance?’ I asked in frustration.

Colleagues, who regularly use university grants, frustratedly go along with it; others may opt to work with organisations outside the university. At a university meeting, a few years ago, set up specifically to discuss how young researchers could be encouraged to do research, a group of senior researchers ended the meeting with a list of administrative and financial problems that need to be resolved if we want to foster ‘a research culture’. These are still unresolved. Here is where academic unions can intervene, though they seem to be more focused on salaries, permits and school quotas. If research is part of an academic’s role and responsibility, a research-friendly academic environment is not a privilege, but a labour issue and also impinges on academic freedom to generate new knowledge.

Number three: Instrumentalist research – a global epidemic

The quality of research is a growing concern, in Sri Lanka and globally. The competitiveness of the global research environment has produced seriously problematic phenomena, such as siphoning funding to ‘trendy’ topics, the predatory publications, predatory conferences, journal paper mills, publications with fake data, etc. Plagiarism, ghost writing and the unethical use of AI products are additional contemporary problems. In Sri Lanka, too, we can observe researchers publishing very fast – doing short studies, trying to publish quickly by sending articles to predatory journals, sending the same article to multiple journals at the same time, etc. Universities want more conferences rather than better conferences. Many universities in Sri Lanka have mandated that their doctoral candidates must publish journal articles before their thesis submission. As a consequence, novice researchers frequently fall prey to predatory journals. Universities have also encouraged faculties or departments to establish journals, which frequently have sub-par peer review.

Alongside this are short-sighted institutional changes. University Business Liankage cells, for instance, were established as part of the last World Bank loan cycle to universities. They are expected to help ‘commercialise’ research and focuses on research that can produce patents, and things that can be sold. Such narrow vision means that the broad swathe of research that is undertaken in universities are unseen and ignored, especially in the humanities and social sciences. A much larger vision could have undertaken the promotion of research rather than commercialisation of it, which can then extend to other types of research.

This brings us to the issue of what types of research is seen as ‘relevant’ or ‘useful’. This is a question that has significant repercussions. In one sense, research is an elitist endeavour. We assume that the public should trust us that public funds assigned for research will be spent on worth-while projects. Yet, not all research has an outcome that shows its worth or timeliness in the short term. Some research may not be understood other than by specialists. Therefore, funds, or time spent on some research projects, are not valued, and might seem a waste, or a privilege, until and unless a need for that knowledge suddenly arises.

A short example suffices. Since the 1970s, research on the structures of Sinhala and Sri Lankan Tamil languages (sound patterns, sentence structures of the spoken versions, etc.) have been nearly at a standstill. The interest in these topics are less, and expertise in these areas were not prioritised in the last 30 years. After all, it is not an area that can produce lucrative patents or obvious contributions to the nation’s development. But with digital technology and AI upon us, the need for systematic knowledge of these languages is sorely evident – digital technologies must be able to work in local languages to become useful to whole populations. Without a knowledge of the structures and sounds of local languages – especially the spoken varieties – people who cannot use English cannot use those devices and platforms. While providing impetus to research such structures, this need also validates utilitarian research.

This then is the problem with espousing instrumental ideologies of research. World Bank policies encourage a tying up between research and the country’s development goals. However, in a country like ours, where state policies are tied to election manifestos, the result is a set of research outputs that are tied to election cycles. If in 2019, the priority was national security, in 2025, it can be ‘Clean Sri Lanka’. Prioritising research linked to short-sighted visions of national development gains us little in the longer-term. At the same time, applying for competitive research grants internationally, which may have research agendas that are not nationally relevant, is problematic. These are issues of research ethics as well.

Concluding thoughts

In moving towards a ‘good research culture’, Sri Lankan state universities have fallen into the trap of adopting some of the problematic trends that have swept through the first world. Yet, since we are behind the times anyway, it is possible for us to see the damaging consequences of those issues, and to adopt the more fruitful processes. A slower, considerate approach to research priorities would be useful for Sri Lanka at this point. It is also a time for collective action to build a better research environment, looking at new relationships and collaborations, and mentoring in caring ways.

(Dr. Kaushalya Perera teaches at the Department of English, University of Colombo)

Kuppi is a politics and pedagogy happening on the margins of the lecture hall that parodies, subverts, and simultaneously reaffirms social hierarchies.

By Kaushalya Perera

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Melantha …in the spotlight

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Fun mode for Melantha Perera and Allwyn H. Stephen

Melantha Perera, who has been associated with many top bands in the past, due to his versatility as a musician, is now enjoying his solo career, as well … as a singer.

He was invited to perform at the first ever ‘Noon2Moon’ event, held in Dubai, at The Huddle, CityMax Hotel, on Saturday, 3rd May.

It was 15 hours of non-stop music, featuring several artistes, with Melantha (the only Sri Lankan on the show), doing two sets.

According to reports coming my way, ‘Noon2Moon’ turned out to be the party of the year, with guests staying back till well past 3.00 am, although it was a 12.00 noon to 3.00 am event.

Having Arabic food

Melantha says he enjoyed every minute he spent on stage as the crowd, made up mostly of Indians, loved the setup.

“I included a few Sinhala songs as there were some Sri Lankans, as well, in the scene.”

Allwyn H. Stephen, who is based in the UAE, was overjoyed with the success of ‘Noon2Moon’.

Says Allwyn: “The 1st ever Noon2Moon event in Dubai … yes, we delivered as promised. Thank you to the artistes for the fab entertainment, the staff of The Huddle UAE , the sound engineers, our sponsors, my supporters for sharing and supporting and, most importantly, all those who attended and stayed back till way past 3.00 am.”

Melantha:
Dubai and
then Oman

Allwyn, by the way, came into the showbiz scene, in a big way, when he featured artistes, live on social media, in a programme called TNGlive, during the Covid-19 pandemic.

After his performance in Dubai, Melantha went over to Oman and was involved in a workshop – ‘Workshop with Melantha Perera’, organised by Clifford De Silva, CEO of Music Connection.

The Workshop included guitar, keyboard and singing/vocal training, with hands-on guidance from the legendary Melantha Perera, as stated by the sponsors, Music Connection.

Back in Colombo, Melantha will team up with his band Black Jackets for their regular dates at the Hilton, on Fridays and Sundays, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays at Warehouse, Vauxhall Street.

Melantha also mentioned that Bright Light, Sri Lanka’s first musical band formed entirely by visually impaired youngsters, will give their maiden public performance on 7th June at the MJF Centre Auditorium in Katubadda, Moratuwa.

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