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Home » ColumnsWit and repartee on PM’s northern tour
A four-day tour of the north by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to expedite development projects there also saw some wit and repartee. He was at the District Secretariat, chairing a review meeting on various development projects. Many were the complaints he heard. One of the participants complained that the Wildlife Conservation Department was periodically issuing [...]
An inconvenient man
My dear Madush, I didn’t think I would ever be writing to you but I thought I must since you are the most talked about person these days. Newspapers, television talk shows and even speeches in Parliament discuss your activities every day. With such publicity, one would have thought you were a presidential candidate! It [...]
Mahinda’s double speak north of the straits up the Indian way
Double speak, double talk, double tongued, double forked, call it what you will but former President Mahinda Rajapaksa thought he could distort through words the facts of recent history, of which he was a chief protagonist and make the Indians ‘doublethink’ on his personal role in the events that brought Indo-Lanka relations to its nadir [...]
Basil’s edict turns screws on Sirisena hopes
Politicians by nature are open-mouthed people. That is not necessarily bad, if what emanates from that space surrounded by teeth is sensible and it is helpful to the people who helped elect them in the first place. But often it is unadulterated crap. Listen to the screaming contributions of Wimal Weerawansa from public platforms and [...]
That ‘political football’ of the constitutional council
It is a matter for raucous entertainment when Sri Lanka’s opposition Members of Parliament, some with the proud boast of associating with known racketeers and jumping from one party to another while others are taped offering bribes to legislators to cross the floor, accuse the country’s Constitutional Council (CC) of being ‘biased’ and ‘corrupt’. The [...]
Foreign debt vulnerability and indebtedness to China
The country’s external financial vulnerability is the most serious economic concern. Although the country is able to meet its massive debt repayment obligations of over US$ 5 billion this year, by further borrowing that would enhance external financial vulnerability. At the end of 2017, the country’s foreign debt amounted to US$ 47 billion. It is [...]
SLPP tension builds up over presidential candidate
Influential sections want Gotabaya named, but Basil avoids crucial meeting while Mahinda ponders on how he could tell Sirisena of the decision Ranil fails in bid to form broader alliance, takes his Ministers on four-day tour of the North Tensions are growing rapidly within the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP)-led ‘Joint Opposition’, now set to [...]
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