Year on the Web
Year on the Web
Once a Prime Minister of Singapore said that he would make Singapore another Ceylon. A few years later, the same PM described Ceylon (now called Sri Lanka) as a good example of a country with bad policies. Since its independence in the 1960s Singapore has become one of the richest countries in Asia, while Sri Lanka has become one of the poorest countries in the world. You and I can do very little about it. The entire blame falls on the Parliament and the way parliamentarians have destroyed the legal, administrative and professional life in Sri Lanka. In the process of grabbing national resources for their community, priests, henchmen, and kith and kin they have destroyed the systems and discipline that the colonialists (I hate to say this) left behind.
Our State management style can be described as management by crisis. Having no long term plans, we look for solutions as and when problems crop up. JR's government was famous for management by crisis. Imposing death penalty for the possession of firearms is another example of management by crisis. We can change our management strategy starting from the legal system. Here are a few areas where this can be done:
1. The Attorney General and the highest law makers should be independent of politics. These law makers should be men/women of integrity and manifest their concern for the country even when political leaders fail to do their duties or indulge in unethical and unprofessional practices.
2. All legal cases should have a limited time frame. Judges must be fairly intelligent to understand the problem, assess the directions of lawyer's arguments, ask critical questions and come to a conclusion rapidly.
3. There must be a system to maintain and repair the court houses and surrounding gardens. When courts are not functioning some rural courts turn into cattlesheds.
4. The Attorney General and the guardians of the legal system must ensure that the laws are implemented. It is a failure in the legal system, if the thugs pass the death penalty on their enemies in the very court house. If the police do not implement laws they should be brought to courts tried and punished.
5. If parliamentarians or any other VIP needs security, it should be provided at a cost by the police or the military, and not by thugs.
6. Whatever Amnesty International says, death penalty should be implemented in Sri Lanka. When one or two go to the gallows, others will think twice before committing a crime.
7. Rules and regulations of Government Departments that apply to the public, should be streamlined and implemented. For instance, the Sri Lankan Rental Board is a lethargic organisation. In Australia when a house is taken on rental three copies of the rental agreement from the Rental Board has to be signed stating the condition of each section of the house. A bond of three months rent is kept with the Board for any damages to the house, to be deducted from the tenant. In Sri Lanka there are no such legal formalities. People are afraid to rent houses, through fear that the tenant will own the house!
Under the self assessment system a Guide to Taxation is essential, so as to enable a citizen to know, with certainty, whether he or she has to render to Ceasar the things that are Caesar's. Mr. P. Karala- singham, a Tax Consultant of International Fame has taken the lead, as usual, to publish the 6th edition, of a Guide to Taxation.
The failure of the Inland Revenue Department to issue a similar guide, before the commencement of an Income Tax year, is a lapse which should not be condoned by the Minister of Finance. If the lapse is due to incompetence, it is time to privatise the Tax Administration.
This is an earnest appeal to the Minister of Justice, Minister of Finance, The Law Commission and other relevant authorities to revive the traditional way of lending money through Mortgage of immovable property. The traditional mortgage bonds died a natural death after the enactment of the Debt Conciliation Act which was very much in favour of the borrower much to the disadvantage of the lender. This killed the Goose that lay the Golden Eggs.
People, stopped giving money on mortgages and looked for alternative methods of investing money. And one avenue which proved disastrous for many was the Finance Companies. People lost millions by investing in such Finance Companies, whereas investing in mortgages of immovable property was the safest and the most secure and lucrative form of investing money over the period of time until the Enactment of the Debt Conciliation Act which was intended to protect the small time borrower.
If the intention was to protect the small time borrower, please limit the operation of this Act to borrowers of money less than Rs. 100,000 like the protection given to small time borrowers under Debt Recovery Act. We are now having a free market economy. So let the lending and borrowing of money also operate in a free market without any restrictions. Let the market forces decide the interest rates. Let the Debt Conciliation Act be applicable only to borrowers less than Rs. 100,000.
When the lending of money is taken out of the clutches of this Act it will in a great way stimulate the economy and increase production by helping small entrepreneurs and others in a big way to start a business or industry. It will be a great inducement for many to embark on various projects who are now unable to obtain finances for their pet projects due to the stringent standards required by the Banks and other lending institutions to lend money. Any one who had applied for a loan from a Bank will tell you how time consuming and stringent are conditions imposed by the Banks, whereas borrowing through a private mortgage of land and property is quick and easy and less cumbersome to many.
Democracy is the ideal alternative to tyranny and dictatorship. If thuggery and robbery infest democratic institutions, ordinary citizens will be compelled to look elsewhere.
Sri Lanka is burning at both ends. In the north and east, a disastrous civil war, in the south thuggery , robbery, murder, arson, drugs, kasippu, child abuse etc., Fractional and communal politics brought about the war in the north. Greedy and power hungry politics is destroying the south. Let us do something or be complacent and perish.
1. The Sunday Times has experience in conducting opinion polls. Please show the politicians to what extent the people detest them. (BBC recently announced the shocking results of such a poll in the UK). The ordinary citizens will not risk doing it openly because politics has penetrated deep into their lives (samurdi, em-ployment, government grants etc., on political patronage).
2. Voluntary organizations dedicated to violence free politics may get together and draft a code of ethics for politicians and limitations of powers and privileges of MPs.
3. Get the consent of the people at another opinion poll.
Now is the time for all good people to come to the aid of Mother Lanka.
I recall with horror a recent incident where a passenger van was hit by an oncoming train at an unprotected level crossing resulting in the deaths of two adults and three children from Australia who were visiting their motherland after an absence of five years.
The Sri Lankans pride themselves in having produced many eminent and brilliant men and women in all walks of life who have earned distinction in countries all over the world. But, ironically, none of them have come up with a solution to avert deaths and accidents at these unprotected level crossings.
Well, in our country, what we would do is to erect road humps on both sides of the crossing which effectively breaks the speed of the vehicles and jolts the driver to take notice of the crossing ahead. So simple and inexpensive with no gatemen involved.
Road signs and bill boards, however large, are utterly useless. No driver looks at them as he is either conversing with the passengers or in a hurry to get to his destination.
Come on, Madam Minister, it is your turn now to act fast and prevent unnecessary road deaths and carnage at these crossings.
More letters to the editor - Stop this slaughter * An open letter to the President * Law Faculty versus Law College
Write a letter to the editor : editor@suntimes.is.lk