Eran: Ranil has no practical solutions to problems facing country

The President’s policy statement talks of policies, but no practical solutions to burning issues, Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) MP Eran Wickramaratne said yesterday in a statement.The SJB Parliamentarian said the President is trying to portray himself as a doctor ready to cure Sri Lanka’s dire economic disease.

“However, the people understand that he and his associates have been in active politics for over 40 years, and that they cannot cure these economic diseases,” he said.

President Wickremesinghe has been the Minister and Prime Minister many times for 40 years, the SJB MP said.

“Mahinda Rajapaksa was the first citizen of this country twice in addition to holding the portfolios of the Prime Minister and various other ministerial posts for more than 40 years,” he said.

Referring to the Policy statement made by the President this week, Wickramaratne said the President spoke about increasing the income but did not mention the rationalization of state expenditure. “Ever since he became the President, he has acted like the spokesperson of the crisis and has not offered any solutions to it. The main problem of the country is lack of dollars and a Budget deficit. There is no proposal for rationalisation of expenditure other than to increase the income. He made proposals for making the public service more efficient. There is no word about the expenditure on defence,” Wickramaratne said.

He questioned whether this government is going to solve the country’s problems only by increasing tax revenues.

“The President’s policy statement does not contain any practical solutions on how to reduce the Budget deficit which is at 8.15 percent of GDP? How to create a primary balance in the Budget,” he asked

Even though the President said that the government lost 800 billion rupees from state owned enterprises (SoEs) this year alone, as always, there contained no solutions in his statement, the SJB MP said.

“SoEs are supervised by the officials of the Ministry of Finance, which is under the purview of the President. Senior Treasury officials act as board members of all state enterprises so it is incumbent upon them to see that they are managed efficiently without furthering the burden on the taxpayers,” he said. The SJB MP went on to say that the President promised he would bring anti-corruption laws. Corruption is a question of action rather than a question of law in the country.

“But, unfortunately, this government does not have any necessary solutions for the country. If there is a real desire, on the part of the government, to eliminate corruption, the Bribery Commission should be made independent from the government. Then, instead of appointing the officials by the government, the Commission itself can appoint. By appointing the police and government officials complicit in the corruption to the Commission, can it be expected that the investigations against government ministers and higher officials will be carried out independently?” he asked.