Private buses cannot operate – Wijeratne

By Pradeep Prasanna Samarakoon

Lanka Private Bus Owners’ Association Chairman Gemunu Wijeratne yesterday said that private bus operations countrywide would come to a halt with effect from today (06) owing to the current fuel shortage.

Wijeratne said that the new school term was scheduled to commence today but his association members would not be able to operate buses. “We maintained services with great difficulty during the past couple of weeks out of our concern for the students who sat for the GCE Ordinary level exam. We regret that we cannot continue to maintain services to that level though the schools commenced. We are facing a serious situation because nearly half of the buses are waiting in diesel queues. There are around 20,000 private buses in the country and of them fewer than 8,000 buses operated during before and after the examination so that children could travel to examination centres and return home.”

Wijeratne said that not even 5,000 buses would be able to operate under the prevailing condition.