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Cardinal has no right to urge IGP to leave post: Defence Secretary

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Cardinal has no right to urge IGP to leave post: Defence Secretary

Defence Secretary (Retired) General Kamal Gunaratne responded to the allegations levelled by His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, the Archbishop of Colombo, involving the Police’s conduct towards the recent discovery of a bomb at the All Saints Church in Borella, saying that the Cardinal has no right to urge the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to resign from his post, during a briefing in Kandy today (15).

The Cardinal speaking to a briefing held recently commented that the investigations into the bomb discovery at the All Saints Church in Borella cannot be accepted, criticising the manner in which the Police behaves throughout the chain of events.

“I say this because I have respect for the Cardinal. He was not the one who gave the IGP his coat. I do not know whether the Cardinal has a right to say that the IGP’s coat must be taken off. ‘Intelligent people’ are aware of such matters. Therefore, the IGP may not be taking his coat off like said. But I as the Defence Secretary know that the IGP is navigating the investigations in this regard well enough,” Gunaratne said.

The Defence Secretary went on: “The saying that the discovery of a hand grenade threatens National Security is not believable. National Security is something that runs wider than that. Those of certain ideas in their minds may attempt to commit such acts here and there. But we are putting every effort to prevent such acts as well as bring such persons before law. Therefore, the people need not be panic.”

Suggesting that the conclusion of an investigation cannot be simply performed in the manner of a miracle, Gunaratne commented, “The conduction of an investigation cannot be simply concluded within a matter of two-or-three hours. It requires a certain time. I am not saying that it requires about seven to eight months. Several days are required to the least. Therefore, our Police, the CID and the Intelligence Units are having their special interest on the security of the churches. Thus certain arrests have been made as well. These matters are being handled. Therefore, I say to the public that it would be a miracle to conclude such investigations and make the arrests in a matter of 24 hours, or two-to-three hours. It needs some time. But I as the Defence Secretary guarantee the public that all those connected to this will be brought before law. We have already come a long way in this regard. We have taken the investigation into so much more than what the public knows about this. “

The Defence Secretary also urged the Cardinal to step back from the matter without making any interference, saying, “Despite the Cardinal’s statement, the CID and Police officers have the ability to go further than he thinks and carry out the investigations as needed. So “do not” rush into teaching them how to investigate or “criticise” the way they do things. It would be alright to criticise, if you cannot be satisfied with the final outcome. But the most important thing is that the investigation must be carried out. It should be concluded. Also, the investigating officers should be able to prove that they are guilty with sufficient evidence. Otherwise, the perpetrators will never be punished before law.”

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04 per cent of air passengers entering SL infected with omicron

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04 per cent of air passengers entering SL infected with omicron

04 per cent of air passengers entering Sri Lanka in a row can be identified as omicron positive, revealed Chairman of the Health Professionals’ Association Ravi Kumudesh, in his comment about the risk of the Covid variant entering the country via tourists and air passengers.

According to the reports, there is a serious of the omicron variant breaching the country via tourists and air passengers, he warned.

“In the first two weeks of January we received a report of omicron infectees. According to the report, we have to stress again that the serious risk of omicron breaching the country has increased due to tourists and others entering the country by air.

At the moment we can see that about 04 per cent of the air passengers entering the country are infected with omicron, based on available data. It may not be 100 per cent accurate in any way given that this was not obtained through formal data. The vast majority of cases were reported to have omicron when they left the country,” he said.

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Sri Lanka’s world largest star sapphire cluster gets registration in the Guinness Book

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Sri Lanka’s world largest star sapphire cluster gets registration in the Guinness Book

Sri Lanka’s star sapphire cluster weighing over 500 kilograms which was found in the Ratnapura area last year received approval and was registered in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s largest star sapphire cluster. 

State Ministry of Gem & Jewellery Related Industries confirmed this achievement adding that said the cluster had been registered in the Guinness Book after it was certified as a star sapphire cluster by the Gübelin Gem Lab in Switzerland. 

The star sapphire cluster was found by workmen digging a well at a home in Ratnapura last year.The cluster weighing around 510 kilograms or 2.5 million carats has been named the “Serendipity Sapphire”.  

The State Ministry said that the cluster which is currently in Switzerland will be taken to the UK to auction it at the Christie’s auctions and get the maximum return for it. 

Sri Lanka is still negotiating with the Dubai-based company which has offered US$ 100 million for the ‘Queen of Asia’, the world’s largest natural corundum blue sapphire found in Sri Lanka. 

The blue sapphire weighing 310 Kg (1,550,000 carats) was found in Batugedara in the Ratnapura District, and it was revealed in December 2021.. 

The rock has been named the “Serendipity Sapphire.” Experts say it has an estimated value of up to $100 million in the international market. However, it has not yet been analyzed and authenticated by independent international experts. 

 A star sapphire is a type of sapphire that exhibits a star-like phenomenon known as asterism.The country earned around half a billion dollars through the export of gems, cut diamonds and jewellery last year. 

Dr Gamini Zoysa, a renowned gemmologist  Said that he has  never seen such a large specimen before.This was probably formed around 400 million years ago,”he added.Experts also point out however, that even though the specimen has a high carat value, all the stones inside the cluster may not be high-quality.

The find comes as Sri Lanka’s gem industry has suffered losses as a result of pandemic induced lockdowns.Those working in the industry hope the “Serendipity Stone” will now attract international buyers and experts. 

“It is a special star sapphire specimen, probably the biggest in the world. Given the size and its value, we think it will interest private collectors or museums,” Thilak Weerasinghe, the Chairman of the National Gem and Jewellery Authority of Sri Lanka, said.
  

Those who disrupt the train services are treated as terrorists and will be arrested – Dilum

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Those who disrupt the train services are treated as terrorists and will be arrested – Dilum

Minister of State Dilum Amunugama says that orders have been issued to arrest railway employees for further disrupting train services under the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

“No matter what the strike is, the train service cannot be stopped. However, I have already instructed that if anyone else disrupts the train service, they should be arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. ”

Question: Now it is the Station Masters who give the train signals. When they strike, a train cannot run without a signal. How to act in such a situation?

“No matter what the anarchy is, the people who run the train are the ones who give the signal. This used to be the Royal Railroad. The train was made by the Queen. Even though the queen was made, people of that standard are not there now. Strikes like this, should not be allowed. Definitely tell this to the media, we have to say this without fear. People are of the same opinion. Therefore, as a government, we have been patient ”

Question: Does being impatient mean taking a tough decision on strikes?

“As the Minister of State, I have taken a decision in consultation with the President. Whoever boycotts this, we will go for the final result. The government has appointed the people. The responsibility of the government is to provide welfare to the people. Terrorist activities cannot be carried out by the people who are getting salaries from the government.

Dilum Amunugama said this while participating in a news feature program on Neth FM.

Gamini Senarath to assume duties as the Secretary to the President on the 19th

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Gamini Senarath to assume duties as the Secretary to the President on the 19th

It is reported that Gamini Senarath will assume duties as the new Secretary to the President on January 19.

P.B. Jayasundera, who had submitted his resignation letter to the President last December, officially resigned from the Presidential Secretariat yesterday.

Accordingly, Gamini Senarath will be the Secretary to the President from January 19.

Gamini Sedara Senarath is an outstanding First Class Officer with extensive experience in the Sri Lanka Administrative Service. He graduated from the University of Kelaniya with his first degree and joined the Sri Lanka Administrative Service in 1984. He holds a Masters’s Degree in Computer Technology from the University of Colombo and has completed a number of overseas courses.

Gamini Senarath, who was the Chief of Staff to the President during Mahinda Rajapaksa’s tenure as President, served as the Secretary to the Prime Minister after Mahinda Rajapaksa became the Prime Minister in November 2019.

It is hoped that Gamini Senarath, who has a particularly high level of public relations ability, will bridge the gap between the Presidential Secretariat and government ministers in the recent past and create the conditions for President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa to carry out his duties at a better level.

An extraordinary Gazette Notification on Principal, Teaching-Advisory and Teaching Services

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An extraordinary Gazette Notification on Principal, Teaching-Advisory and Teaching Services

An Extraordinary Gazette Notification has been issued dividing the Sri Lanka Principals’ Service, Teaching-Advisory Service, and Sri Lanka Teachers’ Service into three separate closed services.

This Gazette Notification has been issued by the Secretary to the Ministry of Education, Prof. Kapila C.K. Perera with effect from 30.08.2021.

The complete gazette notification with relevant provisions is given below.

SL Tourist arrivals in first 11 days of 2022 surpass 31,600

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SL Tourist arrivals in first 11 days of 2022 surpass 31,600

Tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka have exceeded 31,600 in the first 11 days of 2022, despite the challenges emanating from the global COVID pandemic and reinforcing the industry’s optimism. From 1 to 11 January, Sri Lanka received a record 31, 688 tourists, a significant rebound from 2021. 

Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) said during the first 11 days the highest number of tourist arrivals was from the Russian Federation – 5,726.

In addition, tourists have also arrived from India – 5,566, Ukraine – 3,028, UK – 2,370, Germany – 2,046, Maldives – 1,269, France – 1,241, Australia – 1,093, Poland – 771 and US – 662.

However, future trend of tourism remains uncertain amidst the evolving nature of the pandemic and other correlated variables such as vaccination rates and efforts in curtailing the pandemic.

“It is great to see the tourism is beginning to rebound amidst concerns on highly infectious COVID variant Omicron. The collective effort of all citizens contributed to the successful recovery of the industry,” Sri Lanka Tourism Chairperson Kimarli Fernando told journalists yesterday. 

Speaking at a discussion titled ‘Tourism Resumes’ organised by Presidential Media Centre (PMC) she said Sri Lanka needs to ‘ride with the tide’ to sustain the industry despite the challenges emanating from the COVID pandemic.

Fernando said they were also concerned about the continuity of the current arrival trends, given the global spike in COVID cases.

“We saw several cancellations particularly from European countries and India following resurgence of COVID Omicron variant. Certain countries have imposed restrictions already, these are inevitable in a pandemic situation,” Fernando said.

With partial reopening in January 2021 which saw 1,682 tourists, arrivals have been on the rise in tandem with the vaccination rollout, improved health and safety precautions, and easing of travel restrictions.

SLTDA Director General Dhammika Wijayasingha said that the majority of incoming tourists stay for 14 or more days on an average, from the previous 7 to 10 days.

“Post-pandemic we saw a lot of tourists coming to Sri Lanka for wellness tourism and vacation with family. These tourists stay longer than the usual, which extends to minimum 14 or more days. It’s a great trend that we hope would continue from long-haul travellers,” she added. 

Given the challenges they encounter to reach final destination amidst health protocols, Wijayasingha pointed out that the travellers under new normal will want to explore the long haul countries to the fullest.

Since mid-2021, Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau (SLTPB) rolled out promotions in several countries, including Russia, France, Germany and the UK. The inflow of tourists has been boosted by increased connectivity as well by international airlines.

National carrier SriLankan Airlines also launched direct flights to Russia and France after a lapse of six years.

In November, four international airlines resumed operations to Colombo, these include France flag carrier – Air France, Swiss leisure airline – Edelweiss, Russia’s flag carrier – Aeroflot and Tata-SIA joint venture – Vistara Airlines.

In addition, Russia’s Azur Airlines and Kazakhstan’s Air Astana commenced direct flights to Sri Lanka, while popular European airlines Poland’s flag carrier Lot Polish Airlines and Italy’s Neos Airlines commenced operations from December 2021.

Local coconut oil prices to increase if govt fails to meet the demand

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Local coconut oil prices to increase if govt fails to meet the demand

If the government does not manage the demand for 1.9 billion coconuts properly, there would be a risk of increasing prices of both the local coconut and coconut oil, the National Movement for Consumer Rights Protection (NMCRP) said.

NMCRP President Ranjith Vithanage noted that the annual coconut harvest is 3 billion nuts and the demand for coconuts in the country is 4.9 billion nuts.

 Coconut production increased by 10.1 percent to 2,034.6 million nuts in the first eight months of 2021, compared to 1,848.3 million nuts in the same period of 2020 due to the favourable weather conditions that prevailed during 2021. 

In July 2021, the planting of 100,000 coconut saplings has been implemented to meet the future coconut demands catering for the export market. 

“A total volume of 1.8 billion nuts are needed for domestic consumption and another 1.8 billion are needed for coconut oil production. 

The number of coconuts required for export is 1.3 billion nuts. Compared to the annual coconut harvest, the deficit is 1.9 billion nuts. Local coconut and coconut oil prices also went up last year due to this situation. 

Therefore, we told the government about this situation earlier. Due to the careless decisions taken by the government at that time, the local consumers had to buy coconuts and coconut oil at higher prices,” he said. 

However, the government would be able to increase the export revenue if the situation is managed properly.

Although the government had taken steps to import rice to meet the demand in the country, coconut could not be imported. 

Furthermore, due to the dollar crisis in the country, it is not possible to reduce the volume of 1.3 billion coconuts required for exports. 

If so, what the government can do is manage the consumption of coconut oil in the country. The consumption of coconut oil in the country is 240,000 metric tons.

October and November coconut harvests were generally safe. The coconut harvest comes to the market in January, February and March every year.

The price of a coconut could increase from Rs.120 and Rs.130 due to the higher cost of buying for coconut oil production. Therefore, the price of a bottle of coconut could pitch between Rs. 700 and Rs. 800 in the future.

Govt. urged to expedite sale of SOEs if it wants to avoid IMF

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Govt. urged to expedite sale of SOEs if it wants to avoid IMF

Sri Lanka’s State owned Enterprises (SOEs) are set to undergo structural reforms making it more financially viable, competitive, and innovative.

Sub-optimal performance of the SOEs is driven by a lack of capacity, transparency, and accountability remains a concern and, hence, some have become a burden to the public coffers. 

Therefore, the government is mulling to restructure SOEs with Public Private Partnership while the state-owned asset sale process is being, a leading Colombo-based investment and equities broking firm said.

 The COVID-19 pandemic has given prominence to the role played by State Owned Enterprises (SOEs). However, The aggregated net profits of the 52 strategic SOEs was Rs. 7.3 billion for the first seven months of 2021; out of which 32 SOEs recorded an aggregated profit before tax of Rs. 102.8 billion. 

However, this performance is eroded by the balance of 20 SOEs’ aggregated net loss of Rs. 95.5 billion. Only 19 SOEs paid dividends and levies to the government amounting to Rs. 13.7 billion in the first seven months of 2021 with a year-on-year increase of 63 percent on the back of higher payments of dividends and levies by financial and telecommunication sectors.

 A Committee is appointed by the Cabinet of Ministers to make decisions on the remuneration packages and recruitment processes of selected SOEs in order to achieve the objectives of the government policy framework. 

Cabinet approval is already granted to recruit high caliber professionals to the Board of Investment of Sri Lanka (BOI) to increase Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) with an aim to fuel the economy.

 Furthermore, introducing technology into the financial and operational management systems of the SOEs has been identified for corrective measures in advance. In this regard, a web based data collection machanism has been introduced to make SOE monitoring further strengthening. 

“Sri Lanka has two key options at this juncture; first, to maintain status quo, if sufficient bilateral lending and swap agreements materialise early on or second, to reach out to the IMF for a long-term agreement,” said Asia Securities Research Macro Economist Lakshini Fernando, presenting Sri Lanka’s macroeconomic outlook for 2022.


The economist noted that in the current context, the first option is viable only if non-debt inflows of at least US$ 3 billion come, in addition to the government-to-government funding lines.


“In the absence of about US$ 3 billion of inflows, there will be difficulties in meeting the upcoming payment towards the second half of the year,” said Fernando.


The government has made it clear in the recent weeks that the depleted reserves position will not stop Sri Lanka from meeting the US$ 500 million International Sovereign Bond (ISB) commitment next week.

But, Fernando said that towards the second half of the year, the government could come under heightened pressure when it tries to settle the US$ 1 billion sovereign bond due in July, without bolstering its foreign reserves.  
In terms of the rupee, Fernando said Asia Securities has factored in a “very sharp” correction this year.

“We expect some of that correction to take place at least in the first quarter of this year, probably towards the early end of the quarter. By the end of the year, we expect the currency to be at about Rs.245 to Rs.250 (against the US dollar),” said Fernando.

Legal arguments against the proposal to present the draft Constitution

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Legal arguments against the proposal to present the draft Constitution


The basic legal argument against the proposal to present the draft Constitution is as follows;

The proposal is based on a false premise as it denies the process of the making of the Constitution whereas it must provide everyone and every group of people the right of participation as it is a Constitution of the people and not of a Government.

The existing Constitution which is fundamentally flawed is a major factor and has caused all the crises in the country. The major flaw is that it has situated the head of state above the law – above the jurisdiction of the courts. Once anyone is placed above the law, it is not possible to operate a legal system based on the principle of equality before the law.

This makes it impossible to operate the principle of the supremacy of the law and instead the system creates the supremacy of man, which the Chinese characterised as the “rule of man”. Under those conditions, the law ceases to be the organising principle and foundation of the social organisation of the society.

Under these circumstances, judicial power, its role and independence is drastically undermined. Public institutions cannot perform their legally required function, and the administration of justice with a legal framework becomes impossible and law enforcement suffers a drastic setback. Such a situation in law is called “a state of disorder”.

The present state of Sri Lanka is one of disorder and that is the root cause of all major problems in Sri Lanka. The only justifiable reason for the nation to have a new Constitution is to get over the state of disorder and chaos it is in and to return to an orderly society based on the supremacy of the law and the rule of law.

In order to achieve this original Constitutional cause and thereby remedy such disorder, the cause which is the 1978 Constitution must be abolished and all persons, including the head of state, must be brought under the law, as an equal of the rest of the citizens. Anything short of that will not remove the state of disorder and the consequent crises faced by the society.

There is justifiable reason to believe that the proposed draft of the Constitution will not abolish the 1978 Constitution and will instead place the head of state as a person who is above all. There is reason to believe that in fact the situation that prevails under the 1978 Constitution will be further re-enforced under the proposed law.

The present state of the country transgresses the liberty of the people and the enjoyment of their rights. Any and every kind of repression is allowed under the existing Constitutional order.

A primary goal of a new Constitution is the end of this and to recognise liberty as a fundamental principle and to expand the enjoyment of human rights by all. For this to happen, there has to be a proper process for making a Constitution.

The proper process recognized in modern times, practiced in many countries, including India, South Africa, Kenya, Nepal and Thailand, is the creation of a Constitutional Assembly and to provide an opportunity for all persons to participate. If Sri Lanka makes a farce of the Constitution, it has no chance of overcoming the present crisis. It will also further lose confidence in the nation and the confidence reposed in it by the international community.

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