Engr. Kanthar Balanathan
DipEE(UK), Grad.Cert.(Rel. Eng-Monash)
DipBusAdm(Finance-Massey), C.Eng., MIEE
Retired Director &
Specialist Engineer Power & Control Systems
10th June 2022
Hon. Mr Ranil Wickremasinghe
M.P.
President – Sri Lanka
No. 117, 5th Lane,
Colombo 3
Sri Lanka
Hon President Mr. Ranil
Wickremasinghe,
The
Sri Lankan diaspora could now comprehend the fatalness of the effectiveness and
the efficiency of the Sri Lankan politicians, who were seen as enthusiastic to
be possessive and not tolerant of the distribution of wealth to the people of
SL(Sri Lanka). Hence the catastrophic economic failure in SL. The Root Cause of
Failure of the economic collapse could only be identified through a Root Cause
Analysis, which is to be analyzed by a team of three/four experts carrying out
a “Data Analysis” task of the Central Bank. The team to check on how many forex
approvals have been given for amounts over $10,000 over the last twenty years.
Today
people have no food to eat and medicine to cure. Every household item is not
available. People may have to use granite stones to make fire by going back to
the “stone age”. This is also the fault of the Sri Lankan public.
The
citizens should understand the courage and effectiveness of late PM Hon. DS
Senanayake (DSS) is seen as the champion of the agrarian cultural developer
and those who were instrumental in developing the Ayurvedic Treatment.
Please
be kind enough to refer to the lecture by Dr. Shivakumar of the IIT, Madras.
https://freevideolectures.com/course/3122/history-of-economic-theory: “The economics of the agrarian culture commands the
mode the agrarian civilization grows”. Maybe this is what motivated Hon. late
DS Senanayake and the UNP vision and mission.
Excerpts
from Wikipedia: Ceylon (Sri Lanka) Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon) has been an agricultural country since time
immemorial. The chief occupation of then Sri Lanka was agriculture, and land
use in ancient Sri Lanka had been mainly agricultural. People grew their food
and there was hardly any foreign agricultural food trade. King Parackramabahu,
the great who oversaw the expansion and transformation of his
capital, constructed extensive irrigation systems, which is what DSS
followed. The Gal-Oya Development and the River Valley Development Board
oversaw the irrigation system development.
Downfall
In
2010, Mahinda Rajapaksa introduced Chinese made third-grade Mobile phones and every
Tom, Dick, and Harry had including older adults and various unwanted hi-tech
equipment. Well, the internet and mobile phones are considered useful tools to boost
business. However, the level of in-house knowledge, innovation, motivation and
the industry in SL was not quite acceptable for use of fast track advanced
equipment. They are used for drug-trafficking business, sex, and other unwanted
illegal business. Every household had at least three to four motorcycles/scooters.
People started using gas for cooking although gas was not essential in
villages. All these consumed Foreign Exchange (Forex).
Agriculture (Agrarian + Culture= Agriculture)
Sri
Lanka is a god’s given country, with a significant amount of rivers that flow
through various wetlands. DS Senanayake championed tea/coffee and rubber
production. (The only mistake DSS made was to disfranchise one million
Indian Tamils who lived in Ceylon for more than 150 years, He may have had some
political reasons to do this.)
If
you study the wetland, 12 rivers are flowing through various lands. If the
politicians want to extend the wetland and convert the drylands to wetlands, at
least some parts could be made wetlands by diverting/extending the river. The
Minister(s) of Agriculture could motivate the people to focus on agrarian
business. Agriculture was the historical industry in SL. I am sorry to say
this: Every Minister who holds any portfolio in GOSL, is focused on bribery and
corruption and wants himself to be rich. This may be partly due to the Lankan
culture of the collateral of money against the vote. Every MP wants to be
re-elected and hence accumulates wealth. Can we claim that Sri Lanka is the
democratic Socialist Republic? Ex; Wimal Weerawansa.
There
are many potholes within the GOSL administration, and as a writer, I can
confidently state that none of the MPs is honest and patriotic. It is pathetic,
and heartrending to note the political culture of SL.
Please
view this map:
Rivers and Tamil Culture
Rivers
ID: Rivers of Sri Lanka | 1 Mahaweli River. 2 Kelani
River. 3 Kalu Ganga River. 4 Maha Oya. 5 Gin Ganga. 6 Deduru Oya. 7 Maduru Oya.
8 Yan Oya. 9 Kumbukkan Oya. 10 Malvathu River, 11 Kirindi Oya,
 |
Rivers in Sri Lanka
You
can view that the North is dryland with no river by nature or creation. Maybe
this is due to the foolishness of the Malabar people who colonised and
inhabited the area. The government, if focused on agrarian promotion could have
extended the water supply from Vavuniya to the north and set up reservoirs to
hold rainwater.
The
North has petty politicians like Vijayakala Maheswaran, Ananthi Sasitharan and
so on. Vijayakala is elected on pathetic votes as a result of Maheswarans
death, same as Ananthi Sasitharan. Just because Sasitharan (Elilan) was an LTTE
cadre, Anansthi, his wife who is a half-baked fool was elected by the people
for NPC. Both have no focus on agrarian promotion. All Tamil politicians are
petty, although they are attorneys. Although the Tamils want Tamil Eelam, they
have no idea of where and how they will generate Forex. Most Tamils with an
Arts degree want government jobs. Tamils shall overhaul their political
candidates and their vision and mission. The Caste differential system is a mindset
that causes significant impedance in the race. Same with the Sinhala society.
Today,
we can state that agrarian and fishing are the two main sources of an industry
that could save SL and the people.
Dismayed Current status
Gotabaya
Rajapaksa is a fool and has no management or governaning skill. He was trained
by the military to kill people. He carried out killing in 1989 of Sinhala
youths and from 2004 to 2009 killing of Tamil youths. What are the
consequential damages to the country? No dollars, no food, No medicines, none
of the household needs in short.
Excerpt from Wikipedia: In 1964, Dahanayake
gained fame when he attempted and was prevented from entering parliament chambers
in a span cloth (known locally as an Amude) in
protest of the government of Prime Minister Sirima Bandaranaike's rationing
of clothing to two yards of textiles per month per person due to foreign
exchange shortage.
The repeat was in 1970 when people had no
bread, rice, etc. The chain reaction has occurred now in 2022, perhaps in 2021
under the radical xenophobic government. However, was kept secret.
In 2015, when you were elected PM, you convened
a conference where you invited foreign experts, however, none of the local professors
was invited. This conference was facilitated by Professor Ricardo Hausmann of
Harvard University. I wrote a letter to the Professor outlining the shortfalls
in SL. I have attached a copy for you to read. My article has been cited by
Sri Lankan University students.
There are a significant number of weaknesses in
the administration, the reason has been outlined in that letter. People do not
accept educated specialists, but uneducated hooligans into parliament.
Currently, you have 94 MPs with no GCE O level qualification. Will, they
understand “Economics”, “ Supply & Demand”, production, consumption, and transfer of
wealth, will they accept Economics as a Social Science
and not an arts topic, and political economy as a term for matters related to
public administration?
Shehan Semasinghe – Minister of Trade and Samurdhi Development
Mohan Priyadarshana de Silva – Minister of Water Supplies
Mr. Shehan Semasinghe, who has a BCom from Delhi and an MBA
from Peradeniya: Has he got vision and mission for his ministry? He may have
plans of how to accumulate wealth via bribery and corruption, as he is from
SLPP. Mohan Priyadarshana de Silva, who is a lawyer: has the SLPP minister
prepared a vision and mission statement
for his ministry. How about Janaka Wakkumbura who is an ‘A’ level comedian, and
a landed proprietor; has he got any development plans? Apart from they are from
SLPP, which is a xenophobic policy party, what are their plans for development?
If
I remember correctly you stated at the 2015 conference that the government has
stacked several tons of paddy at the Mattala airport. My question was; what is
the Trade Minister doing?
Politics & policies of parties:
UNP:
which clearly states that it is a United National Party. The word National
carries lots of meaning. It is the nation’s people.
Migration
of SWRD Bandaranaike into politics: Solomon
West Ridgeway Dias: Originally
being from a Perumal family which means Tamil, he changed his name to cheat the
British to gain entrance to Oxford. He read philosophy, politics, and
economics. It is questionable whether he read Law at Oxford. With his economics
knowledge, he crossed over to the cheap platform to gain entry into the
parliament to become the PM. He placed religion and language as the key main
theme for political and economic progress for SL. This was a failure. People in
the South focussed on eliminating Tamils as their opponents. From that period
the vision and mission of the SLFP were crossed to race, xenophobia, and
fundamentalism to date. Competition and Capitalism changed to Socialism and
part Communism to date. The name was changed to “The Democratic Socialist
Republic of Sri Lanka”. There is no democracy and no socialism in their
practice. The focus is to eliminate Tamils and make SL the only Sinhala
Buddhist country. This is not feasible in the 21st century PM.
SWRDB’s
entry into politics triggered the minds of the dirty Sinhalese in the South to
build up ethnic hatred and focus on eliminating the Tamils. How much racial
violence and how many thousands of Tamils were raped, killed, and their
properties loot and destroyed. One can assess whether SL is focused on
economics and economic development or live on loans and begging from other
countries. SWRDB’s entry into politics fired the ethnic hatred and destruction
of property and caused the economic downfall and reduced GDP. Tamils started to
move to foreign countries. This is MEP & SLFP we are talking about. Except
for UNP, all other political parties are different, in the sense of racial
hatred.
The
latest xenophobic champion is the Rajapaksa family. He fooled the people by
importing electronic and fancy goods. Rajapaksa had a mind of a child not to
assess the risk, and without risk analysis, he commenced borrowing loans and
flooding the market with china goods. With no project management, risk
analysis, no Cost-Benefit Analysis, the Hambantota port and airport were built,
the latest being the port city.
Agrarian Policy
Sri
Lanka is not a highly technologically advanced country. Fundamentally we should
focus on agriculture. I am not stating that the PM should go to houses and
campaign on agriculture. That is what we have in the MP system of government.
The government allocates a sum of money to MPs to be spent on their
electorates. What do the MPs do? The MPs pocket it. Today’s state of “No food”
is the fault of the MPs and the government. People should be campaigned to grow
some plants in their backyards instead of viewing movies and serials. There are
seventeen universities in Sri Lanka. The products of these Universities: what
do they do? Everyone wants to go overseas. What job do they do overseas? Labour
job. Will they do that job in SL? Well, these graduates should do agrarian jobs
in SL. Every house should have a backyard farm. Additionally a chicken
farm. All empty land shall be
cultivated.
There are two cultivation seasons; Maha
and Yala which are synonymous with two monsoons. Maha Season falls
during the “North-east monsoon” from September to March in the following year.
Yala season is effective during the period from May to the end of August.
If
everyone wants to use and be on the computer, they should train themselves in
software development and be a local sub-contract on software development.
However, the resource we have is water. Let us use the facility. Do not
throw oil and garbage into the river. Keep the rivers clean. Let’s be
patriotic. There is lots of local industry that we could develop.
Vision for future
Today’s
politicians are not going to live long. I believe that “change is a
constant”. Further people in poor countries should develop their
innovation, creativity, flexibility, methodical, organising, initiative,
leadership, decisive, eagerness to learn, self-discipline, and develop analytical skills. For example:
Do people in villages, and towns need gas for cooking? Why not use kerosine
cookers? Gas FOREX is more than kerosine oil. Therefore optimise the use
and expenditure.
Taxation
Gotabaya
was foolish enough to cut and lower the taxes. He did it for popularity without
a clear understanding of Taxation and Fiscal Stability. Please read my letter
to Profesor Ricardo Hausmann where I have discussed formal and informal
microenterprises.
Quote from my paper: Informal and Formal
Micro-Enterprises
This has a large impact on the fiscal
policy of the country. In the paper “The demand for, and consequences of,
formalising among informal firms in SL”, Dr Suresh de Mel, David
McKenzie, & Christopher Woodruff discuss informality and its impact. This
paper reveals that quote: “Even among firms employing paid workers, the
majority are unregistered with one or more pertinent agencies”, and only
one-fifth of firms operating without paid workers are registered with any
government agency”.
Please read Profesor’s paper: “Does controlling corruption lead to higher economic growth?”
Could this be one of the facets that will limit economic growth? Of course-Yes.
PM:
Sri Lanka cannot depend on tourism and Diaspora’s contribution to FOREX. At
least SL should be able to survive the dips. Today MPs are fighting for
ministerial portfolios which indicates their foolishness and unpatriotic
attitude. All of the MPs should pool out their human resources and ability to
prepare a plan to come out of the monetary sag. Rather what they do is campaign
Diasporas to send money.
Solution
A country cannot survive economically and politically with dissatisfied citizens, where their people have been slaughtered and their library which housed historical texts destroyed by the army in 1981 and people have been discriminated against and oppressed. Further, your citizen’s military team has Silvas, Perera’s, Dominiques, Fernandos etc. Their ancestors may have been Portuguese/Mexicans etc. We know about Mexican culture. Tamils are dissatisfied with all domains of administration. What they are asking is self-determination and not separation from SL. After Bandaranaika stepped into politics the country took a turn and on Rajapaksas’s arrival, the country took a pleasurable living with no understanding from the people and the administration for a short term. In 2021 the country’s economical condition had a catastrophic failure, however, the failure was not disclosed to the public. The Central Bank should be a separate body, the nerve centre. The three arms of governance, The Executive, Legislature and Judiciary shall operate independently. However, in SL the Executive thinks that he is the boss of all divisions, which is because our politicians have no clue about politics. I have published two books on politics.
You as an educated person from an intellectual family can now proceed to approve the Provincial Councils with Law enforcement, Judiciary and land power to the PCs. SL need not have ten PCS. You can merge N&E and the remaining eight could be reduced to four PCs by merging two or three each. This will reduce individual and overall expenditure. It is feasible and possible for intelligent people.
Ultimate Solution
Until the Tamil problem is solved the country will face issues and problems and no one can stop it even by killing Tamil and Muslim people. The Sinhalese shall not give flimsy and not relevant excuses to hold onto dictatorial power. I strongly recommend that you and the key personnel in SL should arrange a conference with the Tamil Diaspora (eg. TGTE, BTF, and educated professionals like Suresh de Mel, Dr P. Amirthalingham, CV Wigneswaran, and MA Sumanthiran, and competent economists, and include Mr. Visvanathan Rudrakumaran as the key analyst. Until you research, analyze and arrive at a final decision, it is expected that SL as a country, cannot survive for people to live. People will start to migrate and create a problem for the Sri Lankan racial politicians. Maybe you could invite Professor Ricardo Haussmann to facilitate the conference.
We from overseas expect a positive solution from you to the country, SL.
Your
Remaining
Kanthar
Balanathan
Encl:
Letter
to Profesor Hausmann
Letter
to the Director of Irrigation Northern Division
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