SL cannot lose a friend like China for USD 6.5 million – Johnston

The issue pertaining to the Chinese fertiliser shipment had reached a situation where it had to be decided whether Sri Lanka should antagonize a friend, like China, or to pay USD  6.5 million for flaws in the process of testing organic fertiliser samples, says Chief Government Whip and Highways Minister Johnston Fernando said.

Responding to queries by journalists at a ceremony on Saturday (18) to declare open the Kurunegala branch of the Registrar General’s Department, the minister said that investigations would continue to find out how and where the process of inspecting fertilizer samples had gone wrong and action would be taken against anyone who had caused the issue that could have been developed into a serious diplomatic embarrassment.

“This is not an issue of the sum of money. This is an issue of an agreement between two countries. The Cabinet of Ministers has decided that there had been a mishap and that we would have to pay for the mishap. We have to consider bigger issues involved and cannot afford to embarrass China which is a longstanding friend of this country. We as a government have to keep in mind the interests of people when we make decisions.

“We have experimented with organic cultivations and decided that the government should provide farmers with organic fertiliser. The government made a decision quickly to import them from China. The process of testing the samples had some technical issues and it was decided that fertiliser shipment would not be suitable for us. Those technical errors would be identified and rectified. In any case, in an agreement of this nature, we cannot make decisions as a single party. We cannot move forward as a nation by making enemies of our friendly nations,” the Minister said.