01. Public servants who had submitted nominations for the LG Polls to be reinstated from today: Secretary to the Public Administration and Home Affairs Ministry Ranjith Asoka says they will be attached to the nearest service requirement outside their electorates; asserts they can report to work and get a transfer to the nearest service requirement outside their electorates by the head of the institution.
02. PUCSL Chief Janaka Ratnayake says the electricity consumers should receive an immediate electricity tariff reduction of approx. 20% given the facts pertaining to reduced electricity demand, exchange rate and fuel prices in Sri Lanka; asserts the PUCSL’s demand forecast has been proven by the actual demand for January to April 2023 and reduced demand forecasted by the CEB for the rest of the year.
03. SJB decides to put forward a candidate for the upcoming Presidential Election: Party’s working committee decides to build a broad alliance led by the SJB and to delegate power to Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa for the purpose of ensuring the candidate’s victory.
04. The lawsuit filed in Singapore High Court demanding compensation for the damages caused by the MV X-Press Pearl disaster to be taken up for the first time today: A law firm in Singapore to represent Sri Lanka in the case.
05. Supreme Court grants leave to proceed in four FR petitions filed by four children, all under the age of 14, who have alleged that they were arrested by the CID and coerced into signing confessions to falsely implicate Attorney-at-Law Hejaaz Hizbullah in acts of terrorism.
06. Corruption galore at the Kotelawala Defence University and its affiliated hospital, as many employees are in a quandary about how decisions are made at the Board of Management that do not bring any return to the institution but on the alleged behest of its VC Maj. Gen. (Rtd) Milinda Peiris, who is serving his second tenure violating its Act; allege this course of action has brought adverse impacts not only to the hospital but also to the National Treasury.
07. Arrangements have been made to hold the National War Heroes Commemoration Ceremony with pride to honour the Nation’s war heroes who died in the Thirty Years’ War in Sri Lanka under the patronage of President Ranil Wickremesinghe as the Commander-in-Chief.
08. The Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Sri Lanka (MMCASL) opens its new exhibition ‘The Foreigners’ at its premises, bringing together the works of 15 contemporary artists who use varying media to address the entangled ways in which foreignness is inscribed onto them, making them as strangers, outsiders, or transgressors.
09. The government expenditure in December swells by Rs. 1 trillion; closes the 2022 fiscal year at Rs. 4.47 trillion: Recurrent expenditure increases by 28% to Rs. 3.5 trillion fuelled by hike in domestic interest payments; salaries and wages and welfare: State revenue crosses Rs. 2 trillion mark with a 38% rise of Rs. 548 billion over 2021: Income taxes are the biggest revenue source; up 77% to Rs. 534 billion; relegates VAT to second place at Rs. 463 billion, up 50% from in 2021: CBSL profit transfer doubles to Rs. 30 billion in 2022.
10. The eyesight of ten individuals who had undergone eye surgeries at the Nuwara Eliya District General Hospital have weakened due to complications sustained by the use of ‘Prednisolone’, an eye drop used to treat mild to moderate non-infectious eye allergies and inflammation, imported from India: DGHS Dr. Asela Gunawardena says “this particular batch of Prednisolone had been withdrawn, while eye surgeries had also been suspended in the hospital.”
