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Home » ColumnsOpposition questions Government’s economic recovery efforts
By Sandun Jayawardana On the day President Ranil Wickremesinghe addressed Parliament to brief the House regarding the Government’s economic programme, the Government had to push back at accusations from the opposition over a lack of transparency regarding its economic recovery efforts. Speaking after the President made a special statement to Parliament, Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa [...]
One more out of parliament
My dear Diana, I thought I must write to you now when everyone is talking about you after you were booted out of Parliament by an order from the highest court in the land. The way you conducted yourself, with your razor-sharp tongue and ‘come for a fight’ attitude, who would have thought this will [...]
Divisional Secretary’s Facebook post stirs bribery battle in Presidential Secretariat
The Presidential Secretariat has written to the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) requesting that an inquiry be conducted into a Facebook post by a Divisional Secretary in the Puttalam District, levelling bribery allegations against a Media Director of the Presidential Secretariat. In his Facebook post, the Divisional Secretary claimed he had [...]
Prospects of negotiating a change or modification of IMF conditions
Last Sunday’s column discussed the importance of continuing with the IMF’s Extended Finance Facility (EFF) as well as the difficulties of negotiating with foreign bondholders for a restructuring of the international debt. An equally significant issue is whether the opposition parties would comply with the IMF conditions, were they to come to power. Opposition The [...]
The unseating of an MP and the chance roll of the judicial dice
Leaving apart the typically hysterical political brouhaha about the unseating of Diana Gamage, former (and largely unlamented) Member of Sri Lanka’s Parliament, what is greatly interesting about this otherwise distasteful saga is the different approaches taken by the Supreme Court and a majority decision of the Court of Appeal with profound implications on the roll [...]
Welcome proposals for legal reforms to ensure system change
It is two years since the largely peaceful aragalaya or civic protests ended in a outburst of violence on May 9, 2022. The protests which went on at the Galle Face Green peacefully for several weeks in an almost carnival atmosphere was set upon by a gang of hooligans and the participants mercilessly thrashed on [...]
Diana stripped of seat in Parliament and impaled on the sword of justice
How a British citizen worked her way up Sri Lanka’s political ladder Diana Gamage notched a dubious spot in the Guinness Book of Records by becoming the first artiste to have taken a country’s entire body politic for a massive ride. The power tale of how a British citizen – without even dual citizenship – [...]
May Day mess, selling the nation and arrogance of a fallen woman
This theatre of the absurd that is called politics in Sri Lanka is becoming even more absurd and indeed highly controversial as the elections draw near. As though this Wickremesinghe-Pohottuwa government has not already soiled its escutcheon with the kind of antics that seemed to throw the country’s constitution into the garbage while professing democracy [...]
Ranil intensifies moves to retain presidency
Stops SJB crossovers to UNP until he declares his candidacy In Parliament speech, President explains various measures to stabilise economy and strengthen country Ranawaka opposes Basil’s call for parliamentary election first, says such a move will bring country to brink bankruptcy again By Our Political Editor President Ranil Wickremesinghe stalled a move by an unknown number [...]
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