3 October 2022 09:28 am Views - 92
By Sandun A Jayasekera
“When the Yahapalana regime handed the government to Rajapaksa’s in 2019, Sri Lanka’s foreign reserves stood at a healthy US$ 7.8 billion but the ad-hoc and short sighted tax policy, mismanagement, inefficiency and corruption of the Gota-Ranil regime has brought the forex reserves of Sri Lanka to a mere US$ 1.7 billion by August this year, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) charged yesterday.
The current foreign reserves of the country sufficient only for one month’s food imports, the SJB added.
In a hard hitting comment, the senior vice president of the SJB and the chief opposition whip, Lakshman Kiriella urged the Ranil Wickremesinghe regime to resign accepting its utter failure and incompetency in all aspects of governance.
“Otherwise, the Election Commission must hold the Local Government (LG) polls immediately as demanded by the Maha Sangha led by Mahanayaka’s of all three Nikayas, his eminence Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, the Bishop of Colombo and 22 million people of the country, he said.
Kiriella told Daily Mirror that the entire nation including those living abroad are keen to elect a new administration for the country with their blessings and a new mandate. They cannot tolerate the Ranil – Rajapaksa regime any further as they have dragged Sri Lanka to the edge of a precipice. Therefore, the only solution to the current political and socio-economic catastrophe that has devastated the nation is a regime change with a new programme with a rescue plan.
“If not for the precariously dipped forex reserves - thankful to the current rulers - Sri Lanka would not have to go behind global financial agencies like the IMF, World Bank and the ADB etc. or donor countries with a begging bowl for help or Sri Lanka would not have implored with our creditors for debt restructuring as we have defaulted debt servicing for the first time in history branding Sri Lanka a failed state and a pariah state. This is the legacy of the Ranil- Rajapaksa regime that makes saving the country from the current mess challenging for the next government,” Kiriella stressed.
The most serious setback for Sri Lanka at the moment is that no country or international financial agency is ready to provide Sri Lanka any substantial financial assistance as long as the country returns to normalcy, restore law and order and protect democratic eights of the people. The government does the complete opposite of it, he said.
The UN, its other agencies like the UNHRC, the EU, other international rights organizations, the US senate, the BASL, HRCSL and numerous local and foreign bodies have expressed their horror and dismay over the open violation of rights of Sri Lankans through state terrorism. They have warned in no uncertain terms that Sri Lanka will have no access to foreign loans or debt structuring as long as the government puts an end to the use of draconian PTA against peaceful protesters, suppressing of the media, failure to provide basic essentials to the people and restores law and order.
“In that case, an immediate regime change is the only hope the 22 million people of this country have to come out from this socio- economic and political abyss they have fallen into,” Kiriella emphasized.