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Editorial

Kings, cops and cat on rock

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Monday 12th October, 2020

Some of the present-day leaders seem to believe that they are the reincarnations of ancient warrior kings. A few moons ago, they unveiled a plan to establish that King Ravana was the world’s first aviator and trace his aviation routes. Mythical King Ravana has been ‘more sinned against than sinning’ and, therefore, researchers may be justified in trying to prove that he existed and was in a league of his own as an inventor, and not a wicked monarch. Our leaders, however, have not realised that they have already proved, through their conduct, that another king, who is thought to be only a character in folk stories, actually lived in this country. They have also succeeded in establishing the survival of the royal bloodline; they are unarguably the descendants of King Kekille, who punished the innocent and released the guilty in the cases he heard.

SSP Jaliya Senaratne, who was removed from the post of Police Spokesman, the other day, over his statements about former Minister Rishad Bathiudeen’s brother, Riyaj, who was arrested, detained, and released, has been transferred to Kankesanthurai, reportedly on disciplinary grounds, or, in other words, he has been given a punishment transfer. Interestingly, when the police arrested Bathiudeen’s brother, they insisted that he had associated with one of the Easter Sunday bombers. SSP Senaratne only announced their findings. Ex-Army Chief General Mahesh Senanayake, under whose command, the army crushed the National Thowheed Jamaath terror outfit, in the immediate aftermath of the Easter Sunday attacks, has recently told the Presidential Commission of Inquiry probing the Easter Sunday carnage that Riyaj helped Zahran flee the country, in 2018. One hundred SLPP MPs have written to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, protesting against the release of Riyaj. Attorney General (AG) Dappula de Livera has summoned the CID chief over the release of Riyaj, and they are scheduled to meet today. SSP Senaratne, who made a U-turn recently in a bid to help the government avoid a damaging loss of face, has been given a punishment transfer obviously at the behest of King Kekille’s descendants! Other police officers ought to learn from what has befallen their colleague, and refrain from offering their services as ventriloquists’ dummies to their political masters who do not hesitate to sacrifice them.

SLPP MP and former Justice Minister Dr. Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe, PC has recently told the media that some invisible forces are controlling the police. He has cited the release of Bathiudeen’s brother as an example. The SLPP MPs who have signed the aforesaid letter to the PM are engaged in an exercise in damage control. They would have the public believe that the police, on their own, released Bathiudeen’s brother. But an Opposition politician or his brother taken into custody over his alleged involvement in terrorism never gets released without the blessings of the government leaders, who are notorious for political deals. It is up to the AG to find out who actually ordered the release of Bathiudeen’s brother. (A senior police officer nearing retirement may be able to take the blame and get appointed as an ambassador.)

The President’s Media Division (PMD) thinks Riyaj’s release has been given a media twist. (Two-thirds of the government MPs—100 out of 150—believe his release was wrong!) It has taken exception to views expressed in our editorial, Lajja, on 06 Oct. An official attached to the PMD says, in a letter published on the opposite page, today, that MP Bathiudeen has not expressed his support for 20A; he has only said certain clauses therein are unacceptable to his party, and a final decision thereon will be taken on the day of voting in Parliament. Bathiudeen is too smart to declare, in public, he will vote for 20A and, thereby, make it obvious that he has struck a deal with the government. One may recall that the government has undertaken, before the Supreme Court, to effect changes to 20A, at the committee stage, in Parliament, and Bathiudeen can say that the amended version of 20A is acceptable to his party and vote for it. We will see this happen when 20A is put to the vote in Parliament. Government leaders and Bathiudeen, as we said in an editorial, know more than one way to shoe a horse.

True, the SLPP has won elections without the help of Bathiudeen, as the PMD official says, but the fact remains that it tried its best to secure his support in Parliament, in 2018, to muster a simple majority in the House, having forcibly formed a government. Today, the SLPP is desperate for numbers in Parliament, again, to have its 20A passed with a two-thirds majority. It will have to engineer several crossovers, and Bathiudeen with five MPs is an easy target.

Following the release of Bathidueen’s brother, thanks to the intervention of invisible forces, as Dr. Rajapakshe has said, the government finds itself in the same predicament as the proverbial cat, which defecated on a rock and did its darndest to cover it up without any success. Let the government propagandists who are trying to defend the indefensible by trying to justify the release of Bathiudeen’s brother and claiming that it has nothing to do with a deal between Bathiudeen and the government be told that what they are doing is like giving a helping hand to the struggling cat on the rock. They cannot dupe the discerning public.



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Editorial

Cat out of the bag

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One of the best kept secrets following the 2022 Aragalaya which saw the end of the Mahinda/Gotabaya regime was revealed in parliament on Thursday when the chief government whip, Minister Nalinda Jayatissa let the cat out of the bag stating that 43 former ministers had together collected over Rs. 1.2 billion compensation from the government for property lost and damaged during the tail-end of the rioting when gasoline carrying mobs torched the homes and offices of government politicians. To his eternal credit, then prime minister and later president, Ranil Wickremesinghe’s name is not among the beneficiaries although his Kollupitiya home was perhaps the most valuable of those properties that were destroyed/damaged.

Jayatissa in his speech alleged that some of those who had been compensated had pressured divisional and district secretaries to increase valuations. While it would be freely admitted that brave souls in the public service able to stand up to political heavyweights are few and far between, the people would like to know from the present regime, delighting in flaunting the misdoings of its predecessors, whether it has any intention of re-assessing the claims presumably settled? Among those massively compensated to the tune of over Rs. 60 million each were some former cabinet ministers and a deputy minister, one of whom was convicted of extortion and held cabinet office pending appeal and another who spent several months in remand on corruption charges who resigned upon being arrested.

Even an economic simpleton well knows that the value of real estate today is more related to the land on which buildings stand and very much less or not at all for the buildings themselves. So compensation payable must be limited to homes/offices destroyed by mobs. While nobody could (or should) gloat over the misfortunes of another. Politicians who lost property in the Aragalaya, however unpopular or corrupt they may have been, deserve some compensation for their losses. But as Minister Jayatissa said in parliament, compensation for ordinary people losing their homes in natural disasters is capped at Rs. 2.5 million. Why did no similar cap apply in this instance? Did the claimants have tax files and can they explain wealth amassed to build palatial mansions? And how were these payments kept under cover these many months?

Ken Balendra, one of a kind

The death last week after a long illness of Kandiah (Ken) Balendra, the first Lankan to head the John Keells Goup of companies of which he was chairman from 1990 to 2000, took away from the scene an iconic business leader who built what is probably the country’s largest business conglomerate. Balendra who had no formal academic or professional qualifications began his working life as a planter in the James Finlay managed Hapugastenne Group in the Ratnapura district and a few years later moved as a tea broker to what was then John Keell, Thompson White Ltd., a produce and share brokers under British ownership and staffed at the top by Britons. This was probably due to the professional needs of his doctor wife and schooling needs of his children.

Ken Bala, as he was popularly known, did not come from an elite family, his father serving as a revenue inspector in the Colombo Municipal Council. But his sporting prowess on the rugby field where he hooked for the first fifteen of Royal College opened the doors to a planting career to him, as it did for many other young men in the colonial and post-colonial era. While his exploits on the rugger field are very well known few remember that he was a member of the Stubbs Shield winning Royal College boxing team. Old stagers will recall Royalists of yore chanting “hook, Bala, hook,” from the sidelines during his school’s rugger matches.

After six years as a planter on the thottam, Balendra came to Colombo to work as a tea broker in one of then Ceylon’s very long established commodity broking houses. Like many planters, though lacking in book learning, he had wide ranging managerial skills and it was not long before he was appointed a director of his company. This was a time when tourism was taking off in the country and John Keells was among those seriously investing in the industry. They were the first to build a hotel at Habarana rightly calculating that it could serve tourists headed for sun and sand holiday in the east coast and those taking the sights of the ruined cities from a junction town. As head of Walkers Tours he led the company’s inbound and outbound tourism sectors taking the John Keells tourism portfolio to new heights.

As the first Lankan chairman of the company, Balendra led the conversion of the group into John Keells Holding PLC (JKH) in which employees were given preferred share allotments in the Initial Public Offer (IPO) on the Colombo Stock Exchange followed later by employee share options. This encouraged their acquisition of an ownership stake in the company in which he himself invested substantially earning substantial profits. A longtime JKH employee says in an article we republish today that the group’s culture in the Balendra years centered around the principle “play hard, play smart, play together and have fun.” He adapted long-held colonial management systems within the group to conform to modern times, had an unerring knack of spotting young talent which he nurtured within the firm to its great advantage. He was a patron of the arts with substantial JKH support for the George Keyt Foundation.

Acquisitions made during his time, including those of Whittalls and Ceylon Cold Stores brought substantial real estate assets into the group portfolio now developed into the iconic Cinnamon Life City of Dreams, the country’s biggest private sector investment. He stood up to President Premadasa who threatened to reduce the JKH share to five rupees by courageously resisting the appointment of a Premadasa-backed main board director to JKH. A public relations genius with an instinct for an opportunity and the long term view, he was a business leader who will be hard to replace.

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Editorial

Cost puzzles

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Saturday 8th February, 2025

The government has not yet disclosed its costing formula for paddy. It only releases information about cost calculations in dribs and drabs in an unorganised manner, which has left the public none the wiser. Farmers insist that their production costs are much higher than the guaranteed prices announced by the government; some of them have even claimed that the average certified paddy price should be above Rs. 140 a kilo.

Deputy Minister of Agriculture Namal Karunaratne told Parliament yesterday that the guaranteed prices of paddy had been properly worked out, and they included a 30% profit margin. The production cost of red kekulu paddy was only Rs. 76, and the farmers of that variety of rice earned a profit of Rs. 44 per kilo, he said. Interestingly, the guaranteed price of red kekulu paddy has not been specifically mentioned in government communiques on guaranteed paddy prices. Karunaratne also claimed that it cost farmers only Rs. 91 to produce a kilo of white nadu paddy, which fetched Rs. 120 although its actual cost plus the 30% profit amounted to only about Rs. 118. But paddy farmers say their production costs are much higher.

How can there be such vast cost discrepancies? Who is telling us the truth—the paddy farmers or the government politicians/officials? Will the two sides present itemised cost estimations for the public to decide whose claims are credible? The current cost calculations lack transparency and credibility. Most of all, on what basis was the 30% profit margin for paddy determined? Was it just plucked out of the air?

Deputy Minister Karunaratne told Parliament yesterday that in calculating the paddy production costs, the fertiliser subsidy had not been taken into consideration. The government ought not to ignore such vital factors when costs are estimated. The public, who bears the cost of fertiliser subsidy, must not be made to pay higher prices for rice unfairly.

Going by Deputy Minister Karunaratne’s statements at issue, the government can be accused of having facilitated the exploitation of the red rice consumers by placing the profit margin for the growers of that variety of rice far above the stipulated 30% level. The government should have taken steps to ensure that at least one variety of rice was reasonably priced for the benefit of the ordinary people who are getting by on shoestring budgets. It would also have been politically wise for the government to do so ahead of the local government elections slated for late April.

Subsidies for farmers could be considered an investment in the agricultural sector, for they help incentivise cultivators and keep production costs low. The government is duty bound to ensure that the benefits of subsidies accrue to the public, who bears the cost of them. Therefore, the fertiliser subsidy, or at least a part thereof, should have been factored in when the paddy production costs were calculated.

How does the government propose to prevent rice millers from making unconscionable profits? They have benefited from a 30% power tariff reduction, which must be passed on to the public. Rice wholesalers and retailers must also be prevented from fleecing the public. The government, which has failed to protect rice consumers against rapacious businesses bent on exploiting them, should get its act together.

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Editorial

Trump’s shockers

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Friday 7th February, 2025

President Donald Trump has apparently inherited from his father a propensity to acquire real estate. What he did as a real estate tycoon before becoming the US President has not caused much concern to anyone except some of his political rivals, but the problem is that old habits die hard; he, even as the US President, has not stopped eyeing land that belongs to others.

President Trump has expressed his desire to acquire Greenland. He is apparently dreaming of something like the Louisiana Purchase (1803), the greatest land bargain in US history. He has also disclosed his intention to take over the Panama Canal. Another shocker came on Tuesday, when he revealed a plan for the US to take over and own Gaza, resettling the Palestinians living there in neighbouring countries. Thankfully, all Arab states and even the western allies of the US have condemned Trump’s idea.

Gaza belongs to Palestinians, and the world must oppose any plan to dispossess them of their land. President Trump has brought shame on the US by seeking to capitalise on the misery of Palestinians who have undergone untold suffering for decades. The least the world can do for those people crying out for justice is to ensure that the UN-sanctioned two-state solution is implemented without further delay. One can only hope that the fragile Gaza ceasefire will hold, with Hamas and Israel acting with restraint, and that the West Bank will not face the same fate as Gaza.

The White House has sought to walk back Trump’s absurd idea of taking over Gaza. It has claimed that Trump has only suggested temporary resettlement of the Palestinians pending reconstruction. No matter how hard the White House spin doctors try, they will not be able to unsay what Trump said very unequivocally.

Trump has not started wars, and he deserves praise for that, but one wonders whether he is trying to make America great again by taking advantage of the US-backed wars and their disastrous consequences. Israel would not have been able to reduce Gaza to rubble without US backing. Ukraine would not have provoked Russia into a war but for assurances from the US and other NATO members that they would stand solidly behind it. Now, Trump is eyeing land in Gaza and rare earths in Ukraine. One is reminded of the bloody conflicts in some African countries which have many terror groups secretly funded by certain multinationals plundering their minerals. The Democratic Republic of Congo has been plagued by armed conflicts mostly due to power struggles over mineral resources, especially coltan used in producing mobile phones, laptop computers and automobiles. It is protracted violent conflicts claiming many lives that ensure a steady supply of coltan at cheap prices to the West.

President Trump has said the US will stop pouring dollars into a bottomless pit that is the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war. He has told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in no uncertain terms that the US wants Ukraine to supply it with rare earth minerals in return for financial support. Ukraine is agreeable to his proposition, according to Trump. This is the price Ukraine has had to pay for its efforts to join NATO at the behest of the US and its western allies and antagonising Russia in the process. Hereafter, Zelensky will have to dispose of his country’s rare earths to fight NATO’s proxy war! Unless the other NATO members increase military aid to Ukraine, he will be in serious trouble economically, militarily and politically. Even during the Biden administration, when the US allocated funds generously for Ukraine’s military operations, Zelensky went around the world, complaining that support from his allies was woefully inadequate.

It is now clear that Trump’s second presidential terms will be much more problematic than the first one. He has also suspended US assistance to the developing world granted through the USAID. What other shockers Trump has up his sleeve is anyone’s guess.

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