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Home » ColumnsFlying colours for Sirisena: Qatar Airways rushes team to discuss partnership with UL
A high powered delegation from Qatar Airways is expected in Colombo next week for talks with SriLankan Airlines and explore possibilities of a joint partnership arrangement. The move follows talks President Maithripala Sirisena held with Qatari leader Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani during a two-day state visit to Doha this week. The President had appealed [...]
SLFP faces decisive moment, crucial make-or-break meeting on Friday
Premajayantha makes last-bid effort for reconciliation; more dissidents may be fired, but Rajapaksas also remain tough After all-party meeting, minister says pitch now ready for local polls in January; date by Elections Chief, not necessarily a Saturday One more desperate, last minute bid to re-unite the feuding factions of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) [...]
Explosive chatter
My dear Wimal sahodaraya, I thought of writing to you because you seem to be in the headlines once again, writing books and having ceremonies to launch these books where you say that Parliament should be bombed. That remark has been taken seriously though we all know that what you say should not be taken [...]
The ignorance and idiocy of illiberal laws
When the Law Commission of Sri Lanka jibbed at recommending reforms to the archaic punishment of the termination of pregnancies except to save the life of a mother a decade or so ago, it showcased precisely how the uneasy meandering of conservative men of a particular age group can have a profoundly destructive impact on [...]
A consensus on economic policies and capacity to implement Vision 2025 imperative
The launching of the government’s Vision 2025 (V 2025) was followed soon after by the Prime Minister’s statement on the economy in parliament. Are these twin events a turning point in the country’s economic performance? The ultimate objective of Vision 2025 “is to make Sri Lanka a rich country by 2025.” And it will be [...]
Don’t let CWE to sell liquor, it will ruin our country
After months of silence, I am writing again to the Sunday Times to shed some light on a new danger. The Cooperative Wholesale Establishment was started in the 1950s, with the aim of ending the dishonest practices of vendors who fleeced the consumers. The CWE was set up to sell quality consumer items at affordable [...]
It’s this crazy media, stupid
Now and then – well more often than the phrase suggests – politicians turn their guns on the media. Which politicians turn on what media depends very much on the prevailing relationship between them. Woe unto the media that seek to comment adversely on politicians who fail to keep their faith with the public they [...]
Lanka’s Guy Fawkes drops parliamentary bombshell: Question is, is it high treason?
Wimal Weerawansa stands today condemned by every syllable he uttered when, in the presence of the former President Rajapaksa no less on stage and brother Gotabaya Rajapaksa in the audience with a whole host of Buddhist monks in attendance, he devilishly declared that Parliament must be bombed from above and swiped out of existence if [...]