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Morning Spice by Ginger The police according to recent press reports suspect beggars of being behind the spate of bomb attacks that have taken place in various parts of the island. They possibly don’t think they had masterminded or planned any of these attacks but feel they would have cohorted by helping to place these bombs in various places. One cannot rule out this line of thought as beggars in the past had strong links with the under world here. They looked a pretty unsavoury lot and were quite a nuisance to the public. They disappeared for some time and there were only a few genuine beggars who were totally incapacitated lot. Now those seedy ladies and gentlemen who have apparently lived on the seamier side of life appear to have resurfaced. The beggar population seems to be proliferating and therefore need to be watched. They make ideal partners in crime as they are less likely to be suspected of being involved in such dangerous activities as the one mentioned. The other day a perfectly healthy looking individual got into the bus in which Ginger was travelling and said he was begging because he did not want to steal. He didn’t look very convincing and looked the type who would take what ever came his way. This is the type that needs watching. Hopeful drugs Diabetics too have a better and more effective insuline. This drug has caught on quite a lot in the States. The conventional insuline according to American doctors was best taken about an hour before mealtime. This new form of insuline, however, is just as effective if it is taken only 15 minutes before a meal. Crafty crows On the other hand, they have become pests. They rip open garbage bags, make a big din as they roost for the night, mess up peoples’ clothes with their droppings and even hold up trains by laying pebbles on the rails though nobody knows why. During the hatching season they dive down on passers-by to protect their nests. Mangala Sirisena, writing under "Faulty school admission" in your issue of May 14, 1998 has highlighted the various ruses adopted by parents seeking admission of their children to popular schools. Mr. Sirisena, it must be admitted has indeed hit a bull's eye. He has dwelt upon the shady transactions that are entered into by parents with the conniving landlords, school heads and grama niladharis in their feverish quest to get their children admitted to prestigious government schools. In fact, some parents have decried with utter disdain how after their children had completed their admission formalities, certain school heads brazenly demand donations of a five-figure equivalent. If this is the picture where State schools are concerned one can visualize the plight of the parents who had missed out on their desperate essays to get their children admitted to the aforementioned popular State schools. As the next best alternative they set their sights on the well-known private schools which are widely recognized as the ones which impart a better English education. It is at this point that the real rip-offs are set in motion. It is unbelievable but true that a good number of the Colombo private schools literally 'extort' donations, if you may euphemistically call them so, to the tune of between Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 100,000 to admit a child. Being in no mood to send the child to the ill-equipped village school the parents cough out their life savings if they have any, or otherwise mortgage their property to meet the monetary demands of the ravenous private school bosses. These sly perpetrators surely loom large as sitting ducks for any bribery sleuth if he cares to probe deep into these incidents of naked skulduggery. Popular private schools, it can be argued still maintain that veneer of elitism, though however the public examination results produced within the hallowed precincts of these academies pale into insignificance when compared with those produced by the State Schools including the well-attended Madhya Maha Vidyalayas. It is now clear that parents, despite being aware that the examination results of the private schools at the higher level are nothing to crow about fall over each other to admit their children to these schools by 'donating' colossal sums of money to the schools building fund which should be surely bursting at the seams when a particular year's new school admissions commence. I believe it is the wish of these parents to let their children obtain the basic G.C.E. O/ Level qualification with the highest grade possible in English which the popular private schools are well-equipped to provide thus augmenting the employment prospects of their children in the private sector where booming job opportunities prevail. Sir, you will agree that the activities of these parasitic school heads or boards should be monitored seriously and in order to arrest the stampeding rush to gain entrance to popular State and private schools, scores of other schools must be systematically upgraded. The best equipment needed to equate with the upgradation of the schools should be made available and the teaching of English should be stepped up. It is hard to imagine that the present crop of teachers coming out of teacher training colleges would serve this end. For best results it will be an overly productive exercise to employ qualified and experienced retired teachers who are fit enough to stand up to the challenge by remunerating them adequately. As an alternative young men and women who have obtained a high grade pass in the English language at the G.C.E. A /Level examination can be 'ensnared' to take up a career in teaching by imparting a specialized training to them under the auspices of the British Council, to be followed up by placing them on a competitive salary grade which they would have otherwise received had they taken up employment in the private sector. Bandula M. Abeyewardene, I was amused to read in "The Island" of May 8 ('Enter the Iconophile') Eymard de S. Wijayaratne describing Teilhard de Chardin as a "vast genius"! (Is there a classificatory system for geniuses - very vast, vast simple?) Chardin enjoyed a very high reputation during his lifetime and immediately after his death as an original thinker. He seemed to have bridged the gulf between science and religion by applying the evolutionary theory to human society. At present, the evolutionary process has arrived at the stage of human life or as Chardin would put it, at the sphere of the mind. We are moving to a greater knowledge and socialisation as evidenced by the creation of international agencies like the United Nations and the development of communications technology. This is leading to a greater unity of mankind, transcending the limitations of ego, tribe, group, class, nation and race evolution thus is now operating at a higher sphere - no longer biological but intellectual and spiritual. Mankind has to push this process further until we reach our final point which is the convergence of all mankind at the end - point of complete unity, called by Teithard as Omega. All this sounds plausible in the abstract but when applied to the social realities of today, they have no relevance at all. The unity brought about by modern technology is not a unity but a uniformity. The world is becoming a megalopolis a global network depending on mechanical and intensive techniques, all of them artificial, controlled from a few privileged places. It is said that now we live in a global village and we are advised to cultivate a global perspective. This is a contradiction in terms. A real village has its own language, its customs and its rhythms. Nothing can be more differentiated than a village and it cannot get globalised. Thus the factors which according to Chardin, are moving mankind to a higher level of unity and fraternity, are really bringing men down to a level of conformity and mediocrity. Dan Aelred Graham, a distinguished Catholic writer, made this acute observation about Teilhard de Chardin at a time when the euphoria for him was beginning "A significant indication of the rootlessness of contemporary Catholic thinking is the attention now being paid to the work of an egregious visionary - Teilhard de Chardin" ("The pathos of Vatican 11 Encounter December 1966). I was flattered to read in Mr. Wijayaratne's letter a reference to an article I wrote to a newspaper a few years ago. But I must put the record straight in that matter. Fr. Joachimpillai, a former professor of the Ampitiya Seminary and now domiciled in the U.S., on one of his visits to Sri Lanka dropped in at the Centre for Society and Religion. He wanted to see the workings of the centre and was shown round by a member of the staff. After his tour of the centre, he came back to Fr. Balasuriya and gave his general impression he said "you know father, I think you have plenty of society here but little of religion." This, I think is a fair summary of the theology of liberation which Fr. Balasuriya professes and which inspires all his work. Narada de Silva, I was in Australia recently. Having seen day in and day out the rotten garbage at every step and turn, and pot holes particularly in outstation roads in the island, I was flabbergasted at the progress the Australians have made in 200 years while we have been in this island for 2500 years! The Australians keep their environment so clean without any dirt whatsoever and the roads painted and tarred without any potholes for miles and miles. You may wonder how such a standard is brought about. I suggest that our heads of local authorities, or at least the mayors of municipal councils, be sent to Australia to see for themselves the clean environment and the visual beauty of that country so that they may keep their municipalities as close to that standard as much as possible. GP. On behalf of all pensioners who received a payment along with the pension in May, 1998, I take this opportunity to say a big thank you to the editor, ‘ The Island’ for spear-heading and sponsoring the cause of the downtrodden pensioners from the very inception, i.e. since 1988 -- 10 long years through so many editorials and the publication of views expressed by so many pensioners. The arrears paid was Rs. 4,360. How the authorities of the Department of Pensions have arrived at this figure of Rs. 4,360 which is not a multiple of Rs. 260 per month (Rs. 4,360/260 = 16.769 months) is a mystery. Whether it is an accounting wizardry or modern or new accounting which is now common in most public institutions, I am unable to say. A further sum of Rs. 320 if not Rs. 580 (01. 12. 97) is still outstanding. Expect payment to be effected along with the pension in June 1998 to close the subject. I am inclined to believe it is sheer carelessness and indifference which is the hallmark of many a government institution nowadays wherein no one is accountable to any one in authority unlike the good old days when the present day pensioners were in service -- which is the bane of this society. I would request the pensioners associations island wide to take up this issue with the Director of Pensions and the Minister of Public Administration and also to make it mandatory that all directives and instructions affecting the pensioners be sent to the pensioners associations, since at times the intention of the government is not implemented in the manner and spirit it was intended. Over to the Minister of Public Administration and the Director of Pensions for corrective action very early. K. J. I. Peiris Does a light bulb call for much of a shapely curve? One hand laid smoothly on her thigh The loveliest thing a woman is endowed with A thing of beauty is a joy (or toy?) forever The activists are up in arms against the ad-men In this age of brevity, skimpy bikini is the fad S. J. Aleckman It was revealed by an officer of the Postal Department in a Rupavahini discussion and by the Minister of Posts and Telecom at a news briefing that some postal workers at the Central Mail Exchange (CME) earn as much as Rs. 24,000 p.m. as overtime payments. This works out to Rs. 800 a day assuming that they work overtime all 30 days of the month. There is a rule that the over time payments to government servants should not exceed his monthly salary . But these sorters earn more than three times the salary as over time. The question is how many hours a day they put in as O.T. after having done a day’s normal work, whether they work O.T on all 30 days in that manner and how this obnoxious practice came to be perpetuated only in the Postal Department. Why can’t the government stop this absurd practice and recruit new hands if the Postal Department is understaffed? The government can employ three people with the overtime payment made to one employee and thus find employment for at least a thousand unemployed men. S. Abeywickrama, The TULF and other allied bodies accuse the forces of unlawful arrests of the Tamils. How do they want this to be done? Are you a Tiger? And if the answer is in the negative, allow them to go? Come on, you gentlemen like Pararajasingham, Rameshwaram, Thooyavan etc. should know better. According to them all Tamils are good, then who are the Tigers? They are also Tamils of the North. How are the forces to know this? So you catch them for us or tell us who the good guys and the bad guys are and the forces will arrest and bring peace to this nation. The forces are suffering untold misery and indignity striving hard to bring a peace settlement and prevent bombs in this country, and you cannot blame them for doing a job of duty to see that you, you and me are safe in this land of ours. And our thanks to our forces very sincerely, for keeping us safe. Charles Rodrigo Repossession is costly business Every one knows that recently the PA and the UNP came to a very important understanding on the initiative of Mr. Fox, a British envoy sent here especially for the purpose. This understanding was as regards the gruesome ethnic cleansing and mass murder of the indigenous Sinhala people pErpetrated by the Tamils of Madras origin trained, financed and supported by alien powers and Church groups. There is evidence that this understanding goes further and embraces the entire political and economic spheres. Both parties are for the so called devolution of political power and blasting of the 2500 year old unitary state of Lanka and the creation of nine or ten regions or potentially independent states out of our monolithic state. The opposition maintains dead silence when the government owned profit making Shell Gas Company is sold for a song. The fuss that was made by the UNP was only to deceive the people into slow submission. Today we are experiencing the worst silence while the port of Colombo is being sold to the Australia owned P & O company and a local company called John Keells manned by a Tamil chief executive with the necessary political connections. This Tamil was conferred one of the highest National honours by the government only the other day. Despite the highly publicised transparency, the terms of the sell out of the port are a closely guarded secret. Obviously some thing is going on without letting the people know what is happening to their national property and national security. From what we can gather from the engineers attached to the port the PA will be transferring free of charge the ownership of the largest quay in the port, the Queen Elizabeth Quay (Q E Q) together with 30 acres of prime land in the port on a deed of transfer to P & O and John Keells who have formed a new company for this transaction. This company is called South Asia Gateway Terminals. This company would raise funds to widen the Q E Q by 100 meters by reclaiming the sea and enjoy it for 30 years. At the end of the 30 years we will have to buy the Q E Q and the 30 acres from them at the market price then prevailing after having given all that free to the company. The new company is expected to erect 10 quays and the 30 years begin to run only after the completion of all the 10 quays. There is nothing to prevent the company from erecting only 9 quays and withholding the building of the 10th quay at their pleasure. This will give the Q E Q to the company for perpetuity. Another condition that the PA has accepted is that during the entire period of 30 years we will not do anything to improve our container handling capacity. This clause has obviously been introduced and accepted by the PA to totally, destroy our container handling industry. The above two conditions were highlighted in the Island on 19 January 98 page 10 and 6 April 98 page 11. The restriction placed on us to do any improvements to our container handling capacity was reported in the Island on 15 December 97 page 10. Up to date there has been no denial of any of them by the PA. It has also been brought to light that P & O and Keells get 52% of the booty while an undisclosed party gets 41% and the Sri Lanka Ports Authority gets a meagre 7%. Nobody knows who this undisclosed party is, perhaps we may never know it. The most intriguing situation is that not only there is no denial by the PA, there is also no question asked by the UNP in parliament as regards the secret deal, pointing to non interference and a secret understanding between the PA and UNP. Of late major policy decisions are not taken by MPs after deliberation in Parliament but by leaders of the PA and the UNP after whiskey and soda followed by a sumptuous meal at the US ambassador's house. The ambassador dictates what our national policy should be. Our man simply gulps it down. Would the PA have given a Sinhala mudalali the chance to suck the blood of the nation as they have given to Keells? Would the PA allow Maliban, Nawaloka or Dasa to buy over Q E Q without putting up one red cent of their money? If this is not plundering then what exactly is plundering? One may think that even if this is plunder it could be corrected by another government. But we understand that P&O and Keells have insisted on very heavy penalty clauses if a future government is to cancell this sellout. Perhaps it amounts to millions of rupees as damages and if we were not to pay it the US would not hesitate to apply sanctions against us. This is one of the ways of earning vast sums of money that is often practised by western multinational companies in developing countries. They find a suitable lackey to provide them with an agreement that will bleed the country and at the end of it topple the government and force the successive regime to cut costs by cancelling the agreement and paying thousands of millions out of state coffers. We all know that the UNP was making an attempt to sell out the Eppawala phosphate mines. Now the PA is actually doing the selling out and selling it not only for a song but also thereby creating environment havoc, social unrest and health dangers to the local inhabitants. For instance, in the deserts of southern Peru where these US companies are engaged in phosphate mining the processing of the mineral released a vast amount of a deadly poisonous gas called fluorine in to the atmosphere thus threatening the lives of every man and animal in the area. We too would be faced with the same problem. This is quite apart from the thousands of tonnes of mining waste and tailings that would be dumped in to our rivers and water ways including the ancient wewas which supply water to the paddy fields. What private agreements these companies have with the PA and UNP is of course not known to outsiders. But one thing we know is that the UNP invited the US ambassador for talks on the subject. It is on record that these companies employed such persons as Henry Kissinger and Suharto of Indonesia to lobby for them, when matters came to push in certain countries. From our point of view total involvement of both the PA and the UNP against the interests of the Sinhala people is patent. Now high policy decisions are taken not by the members of parliament sitting at a meeting but by the US ambassador at the embassy while the leaders of both the PA and UNP are sipping whiskey and gulping roast chicken at his dinner table. It is the Sinhala people who must save the port of Colombo and the phosphate deposits of Eppawala for posterity. It is the Sinhala people who have to sacrifice their life and limb to repossess them. Dr. Harischandra
Wijayatunga Down to Earth The Editor of the Economics Magazine, a prestigious international publication, has said in its annual issue "The World in 1998" that every country’s unofficial black economy will do better than its government’s statistics show. Pam Woodall, the economics editor of the "Economist," says that one of the reasons for such a state of affairs is high taxes. Where Sri Lanka is concerned, fags and hooch, the whipping dogs of past budgets, are a good example of high taxes stoking the ever-growing black market in those two commodities. The cigarette and arrack industries complain, they have long passed the point of diminishing returns, and that unless government reduces taxes they are losing business to the unofficial black market. This way the government too is losing money. So they have accordingly requested a significant reduction in taxes to permit them price their products more competitively. Smuggled There is also the recent phenomenon of cigarettes being manufactured illegally here, the cigarette making machines having been imported from China. These illicit cigarettes are being sold at Rs. 1 per filter-tip, in comparison to Rs. 4.50 by the CTC. The same thing applies to the blackmarket in arrack. The marketers of illicit products do not have to pay any taxes like the legal arrack and cigarette businesses. Taxes The CTC contends that if the price of Goldleaf and Bristol is reduced to Rs. 3/- and Rs. 2/- respectively, the total market will double in five years. The tax on the cheapest bottle of arrack is Rs. 137/-. This is really too much. If taxes are reduced by 5 percent say analysts, it should be possible to reduce the current 67 percent black market by half, and double the present legal market from 30 to 60 percent. This way the government won’t lose tax revenue. Analysts also maintain that government should increase the number of legal liquor sales outlets to make a cheaper legal brew more widely available. They point out that Sri Lanka has only 1,500 legal sales outlets, whereas Malaysia with a similar population has 20,000. Question They reduced the beer price by 60 percent some time ago. But beer comprises only 3 percent of the liquor market, and the government could well afford to do this. They have not resorted to any further price hikes in arrack and cigarettes in the current budget. Maybe they realise that prices are no longer affordable, and that these businesses have reached the point by diminishing returns. But in view of the fact that both arrack and cigarettes are important revenue earners, is it likely that the government will reduce taxes? And don’t forget the vehement anti-lobby that condemns fags and hooch as sin products. In these circumstances, how do you bet? |
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