( April 12, 2013, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The United National Party Member of Parliament Eran Wickramaratne charged that the escalating ethnic-religion tension was costing the Sri Lankan state revenue, while President Rajapakse was in attendance of a session of Parliament last week. He emphasized that the breakdown in law and order, and allowing controversies such as the Halal issue to spiral out of control, ultimately costs the state, and the government was failing to play the role of impartial spectator as described by political Economists Adam Smith. He said that “investments must be based on economic logic and returns, irrespective of whether it should be situated in the North or South or amongst Sinhalese or Muslims. The benefit of economic prosperity must be distributed to all irrespective of their ethnicity with partiality towards the economically weaker segments of our society.”
Eran strongly disagreed with sentiments expressed by Prime Minister D M Jayaratne on the previous day in Parliament, who said that the incidents against Muslims-institutions including their businesses were as a result of personal disputes. The MP said that the trouble was when there was violence against one community, the Police arrived on the scene and were passive onlookers, and then try to mediate a peace after the violence has been unleashed. “What is necessary for economic progress and justice is for the law to be implemented, and that is the responsibility of the Police”
He further went on to say that the “UNP position was that the Police force should not be under the Ministry of Defense but under another Ministry as it needs to work with civil society. This is the practice whether in Europe or Asia” The Opposition Politician called on the government to make strong statements condemning the violence and ensure that Police enforce the law.
Hitting back at Government claims that the Opposition was criticizing development projects out of jealousy, Wickremaratne said his problem was with over-investment and the poor management of investments. “ For example I see the economic logic of the Hambantota Port from a Bunkering perspective. But this Government is over-investing and this kills your returns and ultimately affects your cashflow when you have to pay back debts” he said.
He contended however that there was no economic logic to the recently opened Mattala International Airport and said the Government was getting its domestic and international aviation policy mixed up. He said that on 7 April, a Sri Lankan Airlines flight enroute to Riyadh through MRIA was delayed for 5.5 hours in Mattala after reports that a bird was sucked into the engine, although the reason had not been corroborated. “When that problem was fixed, they discovered that the pilots had exceeded their flying time limits. So instead of proceeding to Riyadh, the pilots had to take the aircraft back to Colombo” he explained.
Wickremaratne said it made no economic sense to route flights through Mattala when they were taking off from Colombo.
“No one flies to Europe from Heathrow via Gatwick. If both BIA and MRIA are international airports, Sri Lankan Airlines must fly out of Katunayake or Mattala. There is no economic sense in flying through both airports” he said.
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