Editorial

An estimated ten billion rupees (Rs. 10,000,000,000) is to be spent on elections to local government councils around the country. This hue and cry for “elections” has very little to do with the efficient management of local councils that provide street lighting, maintain byroads and collect citizens’ garbage. It is all to do with power politics.

While it is hard to argue against the holding of elections to these grassroots bodies because indefinite postponements of such elections pave the way for autocratic, centralised government, it also runs against the principle of representative government and what has been in the local DNA for decades.

The elections must be held. The problem is why politicians from either side of the aisle could not bring about electoral reforms to these councils before the due date of elections, which is March next year. Why the Delimitation (Amalgamation) Commission cannot be fast-tracked to ensure that electoral reforms are enacted is beyond reason. The aim of these reforms is to halve the number of councillors elected from a bloated 8,000 plus and ‘re-mark’ the ward system so that the upcoming election can be held on the hybrid system of the old individual wards and the newer proportional representation (PR) system.

If there is general consensus among the major political players for these reforms, at least there can be a definitive date set for these elections – if not March 2023 then June 2023. This is not going to see the end of democracy in Sri Lanka.

The urgency for these elections is largely for optic purposes as far as the Opposition is concerned with the ruling coalition backpedaling to avoid an embarrassing drubbing at the polls. Opposition parties, though, cannot sit pretty in their comfort zone expecting these 341 councils to fall into their laps. They ought not to underestimate the electoral pyro-gymnastics the ruling party is capable of when it dangles its money bags before a fickle electorate.

In any event, apart from the psychological advantage to the winner, victory at these councils does not necessarily reflect on the national playing field.

Sri Lankan politicians have all along been very irresponsible with public funds. That has been proved beyond any reasonable doubt over and over again and the results have shown in the country going bankrupt. Report after report from the Auditor General and even Parliamentary oversight committees have shown how careless politicians have been and this is not counting the corruption. The waste of public funds has been in the trillions over the decades.

The cost of holding an election has been the least discussed issue when it comes to it. And Sri Lanka has four separate periodic elections covering the country. The Government that is dead broke and cannot find the money to pay its employees will have to cough out Rs. 10 billion for a local government election negotiating the bend. Then Rs. 778 million has to be paid annually for the upkeep of the deadweight 4,000 extra councillors who were introduced by the ruling party to bolster its own support at the grassroots.

At least see there is a cost-benefit in what is being done to ensure the system is fixed so that the country gets not a dysfunctional local council system, but one that works for the people.

 When climate change caught Lanka unawares

 The sudden drop in temperature last week caught many by surprise, and those who felt the brunt of the chilly weather were those least able to protect themselves – some children in the central highlands and livestock left out in the elements, especially in the North and East of the country.

The authorities were slow in warning farmers in the North and East to protect their herds. The Department of Animal Husbandry dismissed the deaths of cattle and goats due to the sudden weather change saying these were animals not only living in open areas but with little grazing facilities and therefore, less stamina to withstand the unaccustomed cold. It was only after the farmers saw their herd fall prey to the chill that they began burning bonfires to keep the remaining animals warm. Now, the Minister of Agriculture is preparing a Cabinet paper, we are told, to provide compensation for the farmers when all that the relevant authorities at the time needed to do was to warn the farmers of the cyclonic weather that was heading their way.

The impact of climate change on livestock and agriculture and vice-versa is an ongoing discussion around the world.

At the recently concluded COP27 in Egypt, countries agreed to the ‘Koronivia Joint Work on Agriculture’, a UN Framework Convention for Climate Change that will explore the potential of agricultural practices to tackle climate change.

A report on Page 08 of this newspaper gives details of the need to support smallholder farmers as a priority to ensure there is no further deterioration of the food security situation. When the Government mechanism from the Met Department to the rural agricultural officers does not work like it ought to have last week, especially in the North and East and the central parts of the country, it signals the fact that the drills are not being worked out. A WFP/FAO Crop Assessment Mission currently working on Sri Lanka was to emphasise the need, inter-alia, to provide high nutritional animal feed to increase dairy production in the country. Most of the cattle that died in the cold weather are referred to as ‘batu harak’ or native cattle due to their ‘skin and bone’ physique.

Sri Lanka’s agricultural policy must be in alignment with climate change. Its abrupt reversal of the ban on chemical fertiliser is arguably making the same disastrous mistake as its sudden imposition. Without moving in the extremes there is a need to make incremental changes with adequate transition periods. Agricultural emission reduction is an integral part of the country’s Nationally Determined Contributions to reduce emissions and adapt it to the impacts of global climate change.

The Government’s plans for a Climate Smart Agriculture Practices University indicate there is some serious focus on the subject. But the best-laid plans of mice and men can go awry as seen in instances like when rural farmers were not forewarned to protect their herds last week.