The public protest demanding the stepping down of the President and the Government continues as of this moment in Colombo despite the occasional showers.
Attended by a massive crowd, the anti-government protest is being held in a peaceful manner and is expected to continue tomorrow.
MIAP
The public protest at the Galle Face demanding the stepping down of the President and the Government since this (09) morning will continue for 48-hours straight.
The protest was attended by anti-government demonstrators in many parts of the country and these demonstrators also marched to the Presidential Secretariat in continuity of the demonstrations.
MIAP
All licenced banks will be open on April 11 and 12 for customers despite the two dates being declared as public holidays, the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) said in a statement.
The CBSL has instructed to operate the banks on these two days despite the holidays.
MIAP
Anti-government protestors have gathered in large numbers outside the Presidential Secretariat Colombo despite heavy security in the premises.
These demonstrators demanding the stepping down of the President and the government.
MIAP
Anti-government protesters from many parts of the country are swarming throughout the Galle Face Green in astronomical numbers demanding the stepping down of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and the Government since this (09) morning. The protest is expected to last 48 hours straight unless intercepted first.
These demonstrators are demanding that the President and the Government shall be stepping down from their positions immediately. The protest is endorsed by people of all social statuses including but not limited to artists, trade union leaders, people of professions, and the youth community.
MIAP
Protesters from many parts of the country are swarming in thousands at Galle Face, Colombo demanding the stepping down of President Rajapaska and the Government.
Some demonstrators are joining on protests on both sides of the road near the Shangri-La Hotel.
These demonstrators are swarming throughout the Galle Face ground since around 8 am this morning and are expected to grow by the evening.
MIAP
His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith the Archbishop of Colombo joining a protest held in Negombo this (09) morning told media that every citizen should be encouraged to demonstrate their objection to remove the corrupt regime of the country.
“This situation cannot be allowed to continue. We urge every citizen of this country to unite to change this system. Let us get together and tell them to go now, enough with the destruction. Go now. Hand it over to someone who can rule. May everyone have the courage to continue this struggle throughout Sri Lanka and take to the streets to eradicate this corrupt system,” the Cardinal said.
MIAP
The regular power cuts and non- availability of sufficient quantities of fuel to operate generators have also hampered the day to day operation of tea export companies. The exporters of value added tea have been affected more than others as the tea packing machines that normally operates on 2-3 shifts per day are unable to function even on a single shift without any interruption due to the power cuts. The brand owners face a huge challenge in fulfilling their contractual obligations to the foreign buyers. The exporters are unable to plan the production due to long power cuts. The end result would be low export volume and revenue from tea sector during year 2022. The association has sought the assistance of Sri Lanka Tea Board to obtain the fuel requirements for tea exporters but CEPETCO has not been able to supply the required quantities. The fuel issue also affects the tea manufacturers and transport of tea to Colombo for the auction. The escalation of transport cost along with high auction prices negatively impact on the competitiveness of Ceylon Tea in the global market. It is necessary to provide fuel to the export industries on priority basis in order to ensure the continuous foreign exchange earnings that are vital to the country at the moment.
The Sri Lankan tea exporters who are grappling with a number of internal and external issues such as low tea crop, high COP, fuel issue, sanctions on Russia, high freight rates etc are concerned of the possible loss of market share for Ceylon Tea if the corrective measures are not taken immediately.
Since November last year the domestic tea crop has been declining largely due to the non- application of fertilizer on time and also due to adverse weather conditions prevailed in the tea growing regions during the last few months. In the first two months of 2022 Sri Lanka registered a tea crop of 41 million kg as against 45.7 million kg registered in the same period last year, a decline of 4.7 million kg. As per the tea quantities offered at the Colombo tea auction during the month of March 2022, it is estimated that the tea crop in the first quarter would be in the range of 65 million kg, a drop of about 10% compared to last year. Although tea cropping months have begun with the onset of rain, the fertilizer is adequately not available for the tea growers. Further, the price of fertilizer has gone up by three to four folds making it unaffordable to many tea producers. Since tea export volumes are directly related to available tea crop, the tea export volume is also estimated to be lower by about 8-10% in the first quarter of the year. The exporters are worried about losing Ceylon tea market share to other competitors and also losing valuable foreign exchange earnings.
The value added tea export sector is also affected from shortage of tea packaging materials. The suppliers of tea packaging materials who depend on imported raw materials are unable to secure the required quantities due to shortage of dollars. They do not get priority from Banks when LC is opened for import of materials. The prices of packaging materials too have gone up with the dollar shortage. A similar situation is seen in the supply of tea flavours and other inputs for value addition of Ceylon Tea. These factories too suffer from power cuts and shortage of fuel.
At present, the Colombo tea auction prices have gone up to record levels due to the depreciation of the local currency and non – availability of sufficient quantities. The situation has temporarily mitigated the adverse impact of sanctions on Russia on Colombo tea auction prices. Sri Lanka used to export about 28-30 million kg of tea to Russia and another 4 million kg tea to Ukraine annually. Though there are no sanctions on Ukraine, export of tea to this country has been affected due to disruptions to the shipping and other logistic arrangements. The infrastructure in most parts of Ukraine has been damaged and therefore the retail businesses will not be able to resume the operations soon. The US/EU sanctions on Russia, depreciation of the Ruble, curtail of shipping movements etc have affected Sri Lanka tea exports to this important market. As per available media reports, India and Russia have agreed to carry out their trading business using the Rupee & Ruble. This will enable the Indian tea exporters to continue to supply tea to the Russian market at the expense of Sri Lanka and some other suppliers. China and Vietnam who do not accept US & EU sanctions on Russia will also continue with their tea supplies to the Russian market. Tea Exporters Association (TEA) has suggested to Sri Lanka Tea Board to explore the possibility of having a mutual trading arrangement with Russia but Sri Lanka is yet to initiate any dialogue with Russia on this matter. Since the Russian sanctions may get dragged on for some time, the absence of any acceptable solution to the issue could affect the Ceylon tea share in the Russian market at least in the short to medium terms.
Tea Exporters continue to face difficulties in getting the empty containers for supply of tea. The freight rates have further escalated with sanctions on Russia affecting the pricing of Ceylon Tea. The high COP and the tea auction prices combined with other internal & external factors may adversely affect Sri Lanka tea exports not only to Russia but to other destinations as well.
Some foreign buyers are inquiring about the uninterrupted supply of Ceylon Tea under the current situation in the country. Tea Exporters Association ( TEA ) members are committed to increase the volume of export of tea and foreign exchange earnings and request the responsible state agencies to address the prevailing issues without delay as they could seriously affect the sustainability of the tea industry. The government may also explore the possibility of having a special trading arrangement with Russia to safeguard the important Russian market for Ceylon Tea. It is a matter of time that Colombo tea auction experiences the heat of Russian sanctions.
Tea Exporters Association
If imran khan’s opponents hoped their push to unseat him would move at the blistering pace of a Twenty20 cricket match, the Pakistani prime minister has instead dragged them into the slog of a five-day Test. Tension had been building as Mr Khan’s precariously ruling coalition frayed. It looked as if enough defectors had joined the opposition to bring down his government in a no-confidence vote in Pakistan’s National Assembly on April 3rd. But the prime minister, who captained Pakistan’s triumph in the 1992 World Cup cricket final, bowled a googly. He declared the bid to unseat him a foreign conspiracy, dodged the floor vote, dissolved parliament and called for fresh elections.
Opposition legislators cried foul. They said Mr Khan had violated the constitution by getting the deputy speaker of the assembly, a close ally, to quash the vote on vague grounds of a national security threat. The Supreme Court was called in to umpire the mess. The judges have refused to be rushed. On April 6th they held a third day of hearings, and were due to resume on April 7th. Pakistan is meanwhile in constitutional deadlock.
If the judges rule against Mr Khan, the no-confidence vote will be held and he will almost certainly be out of power, less than four years into his five-year term. A new government, probably a broad coalition led by Shehbaz Sharif, the brother of Mr Khan’s predecessor Nawaz Sharif, would then be in charge.
The court could rule instead for fresh elections under a caretaker government. By law such a vote should take place within 90 days, but officials say it might take longer to prepare. This could give Mr Khan what he wants, which is time to mount a counter-offensive against opponents he berates as corrupt. The court could also simply dither. The longer the legal stand-off ensues, the less inclined the judges would be to reconstitute the assembly and reimpose the vote, the opposition fears.
The crisis has flared quickly and reflects a rapid downturn in Mr Khan’s fortunes. The 69-year-old won power in 2018 on an anti-corruption platform, promising to dislodge the country’s venal political elite. He also vowed to create an Islamic welfare state.
But though he had some success averting damage from the pandemic, extending a social safety net and offering health insurance, Pakistan’s worsening economy is hurting ordinary people. Inflation is almost 13% (see chart). The Pakistani rupee trades at more than 180 to the dollar, 50% more than when Mr Khan took charge. The World Bank says gdp per person has fallen from nearly $1,500 in 2018 to $1,200 in 2020. Mr Khan’s confrontational style and insistence on jailing “corrupt” political opponents also left little room to manoeuvre while defending a slim majority.
But many believe the biggest factor in his fall has been a breakdown in relations with the chief of the army staff, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, though Mr Khan denies a rift. The army for its part has always insisted, implausibly, that it is politically neutral. For years, Mr Khan’s opponents have charged that he owes his ascent solely to the powerful, unaccountable military establishment that has ruled Pakistan directly for much of its history and pulled strings for much of the rest.
General Bajwa and Mr Khan appeared to clash in October over who should be head of the armed forces’ formidable Inter-Services Intelligence (isi), a sprawling agency with covert fingers in many pies, including Afghanistan. The suspicion that Mr Khan wished to disrupt the military line of succession in order to have his own man in the top job proved too much for General Bajwa, some analysts believe.
Mr Khan’s railing against America and its allies may also have alarmed the army. The prime minister appeared in Moscow, shaking hands with Vladimir Putin, on the very day that Russia invaded Ukraine. That was perhaps seen as an embarrassment—though not by Mr Khan, who has roused supporters by declaring that America is conspiring with the opposition to oust him for daring to pursue his own foreign policy, and for seeking good relations with Russia and China. Yet Mr Khan has given no evidence of any plot and America dismisses the charge as baseless.
Cosy relations with the army are unlikely to resume, whatever the Supreme Court rules. This could spell trouble for Mr Khan, regardless of whether his fate is handed back to parliament, or to the polls. Yet the prime minister’s populist gambit—casting his looming parliamentary defeat as international persecution abetted by a traitorous opposition—may prove tactically deft. Polling by Gallup suggests that 36% of Pakistanis buy the conspiracy line. Among shopkeepers in a commercial district of Rawalpindi that voted for his party in 2018, many accept his claim that the West is out to get him. “America will never want Imran Khan in power, because he is not a yes-man,” says Mohammed Zahid, who sells embroidered women’s tunics. “External powers don’t like that our country now has true leadership.”
THE ECONOMIST
COLOMBO, April 8 (Reuters) – Sri Lanka’s central bank doubled its key interest rates on Friday, raising each by an unprecedented 700 basis points to tame inflation that has soared due to crippling shortages of basic goods driven by a devastating economic crisis.
The heavily indebted country has little money left to pay for imports, meaning fuel, power, food and, increasingly, medicines are in short supply.
Street protests have been held nearly non-stop for more than a month, despite a five-day state of emergency and a two-day curfew.
The Central Bank of Sri Lanka’s (CBSL) monetary board raised its standing lending facility (LKSLFR=ECI) to 14.50% and its standing deposit facility (LKSDFR=ECI) to 13.50%.
The build-up of aggregate demand, domestic supply disruptions, the plunge of the local currency and high prices of commodities globally could keep up the pressure on inflation, CBSL said in its monetary policy decision statement.
“The rate hike will give a strong signal to investors and markets that we are coming out of this as soon as possible,” governor P. Nandalal Weerasinghe said at a post-policy decision briefing.
INDEPENDENT CENTRAL BANK
Weerasinghe said that he wanted to run the central bank independently without any external influence and that he had been given the authority to do so by the president and has been asked to expedite measures to get the country out of the current crisis.
“I want to be very clear that my message is not one of blind positivity. Things are challenging and we need to take decisive action. Things will get worse before they get better, but we need to apply the breaks to this vehicle before it crashes,” he added.
Inflation hit 18.7% in March.
An analyst had expected hikes of up to 400 basis points. read more
“With the monetary policy tightening now finally clear, the stage is set to take the next vital steps with regards to IMF and debt restructuring and clearly communicate this to the international stage,” said Thilina Panduwawala, head of economic research at Frontier Research.
Finance Minister Ali Sabry said earlier that the country must urgently restructure its debt and seek external financial help, while the main opposition threatened a no-confidence motion in the government and business leaders warned exports could plummet.
“We cannot step away from repaying debt because the consequences are terrifying. There is no alternative, we must restructure our debt,” Sabry told parliament.
J.P. Morgan analysts estimate that Sri Lanka’s gross debt servicing costs will amount to $7 billion this year, with a $1 billion repayment due in July.
“We have to go for a debt moratorium,” said Sabry, who offered to quit a day after he was appointed on Monday but later confirmed that he was still finance minister.
“We have to suspend debt repayment for some time and get bilateral and multilateral support to manage our balance of payments.”
NO-CONFIDENCE MOTION?
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa is running his administration with only a handful of ministers after his entire cabinet resigned this week, while the opposition and some coalition partners rejected calls for a unity government to deal with the country’s worst crisis in decades.
At least 41 lawmakers have quit the ruling coalition to become independents, though the government says it still has a majority in parliament. read more
“The government needs to address the financial crisis and work to improve governance, or we will move a no-confidence motion,” Sajith Premadasa, leader of the Samagi Jana Balawegaya opposition group, said in parliament.
Sabry, a former justice minister, said political stability was necessary as the country prepared to start talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) this month. Weerasinghe said he will be holding a virtual meeting with the IMF on April 11.
Earlier on Friday, nearly two dozen associations, representing industries that collectively employ a fifth of the country’s 22 million people, together urged the government to quickly seek financial help from the IMF, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
Masakorala said that both merchandise and service exports could drop 20%-30% this year due to a dollar shortage, higher freight costs and power cuts.
Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves have plunged some 70% in the past two years, hitting $1.93 billion at the end of March.
RegisterWriting by Krishna N. Das; Additional reporting by Swati Bhat; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Raju Gopalakrishnan, Hugh Lawson and John Stonestreet
By Uditha Jayasinghe and Devjyot Ghoshal
