Call for legalising cannabis: President stresses need for policy decision

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has said that a policy decision will have to be made as the request for legalizing cannabis for medical purposes.

The President said so while participating in the Eighth Discussion with the Village Programme (Gama Samaga Piliusandarak) on the banks of the Kukulkatuwa tank in Thanamalwila Aluthwewa Grama Niladhari Division, Monaragala, on Saturday. He was answering a question raised by an academic, who said that cannabis was mostly grown in Moneragala and the cultivators faced legal constraints as the plant was illegal. “The plant is widely used in the Hela and Ayurvedic medicinal systems. The medicine is made from the plants that are cultivated by those farmers. However, the farmers are considered an unwanted lot. This situation could be rectified if the government legalizes the plant. Even the United Nations recently announced that the plant would no longer be considered a narcotic but a medicinal herb with healing powers.”

“A policy decision has to be made in this regard, and a policy will have to be formulated,” the President said.

The academic said that he had conducted studies on the plant for years and written two books. He wanted to present them to the President. One of the books is a draft policy proposal, the academic said.

President Rajapaksa said that he had read one of them and asked the academic to submit the draft policy proposal.

The academic said that the government should pay special attention to removing the legal barriers so that it would become an income generating plant and the farmers in the district could be benefited mostly. The government should introduce a mechanism to prevent the abuse of the plant instead of banning it completely.

The President asked the District Secretary what his opinion was.

The District Secretary said that discussions in this regard so far had been conducted only at the lower level but the decisions to legalise should be made at higher levels.

President Rajapaksa instructed all departments and institutions, including Wildlife, Forestry, Environment and Land, to formulate new laws in the interest of the people, taking into account requests from the public.

President Rajapaksa said that by Friday he has signed 17,000 deeds that have been finalised after resolving the issues.

Uva Provincial Governor A.J.M. Muzammil, State Ministers Shasheendra Rajapaksa, Vijitha Berugoda, MPs Jagath Pushpakumara, Kumarasiri Ratnayake, Dayashan Navanandana, former Member of Parliament Sumedha G. Jayasena, Chief Adviser to the President Lalith Weeratunga and a large number of people’s representatives, Secretaries to Ministries, Heads of Government Institutions and the Security Forces participated in the ‘Discussion with the Village’ programme held at the Kukulkatuwa Lake.

The “Discussion with the Village” programme was launched on September 25, 2020, in the Badulla District. Past programmes were organized covering Matale, Ratnapura, Anuradhapura, Ampara, Polonnaruwa and Kalutara districts.