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Morning Spice by Ginger
Clubs for the old and lonelyGinger was happy to note that more than one senior citizens club has got off the ground. Some of them cater for quite a range of recreational interests. What I mean is that you cannot expect the over sixties to be interested in boxing and karate and all that — there are few complications like brittle bones and so forth that rule out the rougher forms of recreation but all in all there are many things a senior citizen can do by joining such clubs besides there may be quite a few fresh friendships struck even relatively late in life.
Most of these associations meet in the city proper if I am not mistaken but I truly hope I am. What of the suburbs and the provincial towns? If there are no such clubs for the old and the lonely it would be great thing if those who have made a success of their clubs with the help of some service minded firms or service clubs make a study of the type of person in need of such a facility, their finances and interests peculiar to those living in different areas and suggest the correct guide lines to form such clubs outside the city as well.
Chinese method
China has its own method of making her economy tick and is certainly getting quite so hide-bound and inflexible as she was a decade ago from derailing from certain Marxist fundamentals. Now for instance there is likely to be an epoch making constitutional change in the next century.The government will propose that individuals will once again have the right to own private property. That will wider the scope of private ownership as well as signal the abandonment of one of the fundamental principles of commission.
Sulkelto in Japan
Are the local politicians having what they call Sukelto in Japan. A Sukelto in Japan can play quite an important role in many an instance. He is someone who comes to help out in an emergency. If there is a crisis situation you could always hire a Sukelto so that explains the number of Sukeltos in the NWP currently.In Japan of course they can be recruited for seasonal work or when an office is short of workers. Now they can be invited to play baseball for a team and two of them can be non nationals. Now soccer teams in Japan too have started recruiting ‘helpers’ from outside.
Eppawela phospate mining:
Learn from the jagged uninhabitable island of NauruI must commend you for publishing the article on Eppawela- a disaster in the making by Nihal Fernando in your issue of Wednesday, January 13 ‘99 which is factual and well written and I do hope that the powers that will take stock of the situation and adopt remedial steps before it is too late.
On the 15th of June, last year I wrote to you on the same subject in which it was mentioned how phosphate mining had ruined the Western Pacific island of Nauru. An alarming article which appeared in the ‘Readers Digest’ last year draws attention to the islanders who were living and spending as if there were no tomorrows. Nauru had everything they needed- coconut trees for food and drink, magnificent spreading Tomano trees for shade, abundant bird life and ocean full of fish. They were living on one of he richest piles of phosphate rock on globe. For most of this century, millions of tons of phosphate were shipped to Australia and New Zealand where they fertilized fields and farms. These once self sufficient people are, according to the author of the article, caught up in a grim fairy tale. The phosphate is almost gone and most of the money too. The heart is dug out of 4/5ths of the island. What was once a tropical paradise has been changed to a jagged uninhabitable desert of coral tombstones. Kinza Clodumar the President mourns "that our sad history serves as a poignant example to the rest of the world of what can happen when humans disregard the good earth that sustains them".
With plans afoot to mine Eppawela the agricultural heartland of the NCP will be affected including Anuradhapura at the apex of the triangle with Tambuttegama on the Western side and Maha Illuppalama on the East. There is no doubt that there is bound to be an impact also on the Ritigala Strict Natural Reserve to the East.
There is a great lesson to learn from Nauru. Instead of chasing transient profits with great repercussion for the future we should pay planned attention to the agricultural development of this province with the Maha Illuppalama Agricultural Research Institute hard by which must spearhead the new drive for agriculture in the NCP.
It will be a sad day if, after mining Eppawela, a desert is left behind.
A.C.S Candappa
Colombo 04
Why is the government bluffing?
I as a mother know the anguish the parents of Miss Dharshane Gunasekera chief stewardess of Lion Air are going through. It has been three and half months since 29th September ‘98 the Lion Air crash and still the parents are having hope that the daughter is still alive. Every day the papers give different versions about the crash. Now who is trying to fool whom? The cold blooded LTTE killers have won the battle knowing how scared the government is not allowing flight movements from the North and South. The last three months have made my only son so frustrated that he could not come down to Colombo to see me.
My brother was aboard this ill- fated aircraft when it crashed. Now all I want to know is whether it crash due to a technical error or was it shot down? Why is the government taking so long to give us close relatives an answer. Why are they bluffing with this case? Is it because they are waiting to cover up something or just waiting for the civilians in Jaffna to perish or waiting for the civilians in Jaffna to get fed up with the LTTE.
Mrs N. Buarnaswari
Colombo
As the problem of transport is going from bad to worse, it is being discussed daily by the bus commuters.
Why cannot the transport authorities get down double-decker buses. Our roads are now broad enough with a premixed surface. If double-decker buses could be run on the Galle road, High-level road, the Negombo road and the Kandy road, it would to a great extent solve the problem of transport. The roads too would be less congested.
The problem of bus transport should be solved quickly.
J. T. Mirando
Negombo
G. C. E. (A/L) English paper
Injustice caused to studentsI am a parent of a student who offered English as a subject for the G. C. E. (Advanced Level) examination. My son got a B for it. Although he expected an A, he can be content with what he has got, his results being two A’s and two B’s. But he told me the other day that his firends were not happy about their English results. Some who expected B’s have ended up with S’s whereas other who expected B’s with C’s. There are many others who are good in English but have failed. They have however fared well in all other subjects.
We have told by the Education Ministry that it is trying to popularise the A/L English among students, English being the gateway to the rest of the world. Quite true! A country like ours must encourage our children to learn at least two more languages in addition to Sinhala or Tamil.
But, I think there is no communcatin betweeen the Education Ministry and those who mark the A/L English papers. Although those who fare badly in English should not be given distinctions or credits, those who fare reasonbly well must be encoraged by some kind of rewards which in this case are adequate marks so that they can enter university if they have fared well in other subjects as well. And students who offer English at A/L and fare reasonably well must not be ‘penalised’ in this manner by those who mark their answer scripts by setting high standards for them.
If this trends continues, the day will not be far off when students get fed up with their A/L English and opt for some other subject.
I repeat that anyone who offers English should not be given high marks simply because he or she offers the so-called Kaduwa at A/L. The point that I want to make is that those who fare well should be rewarded accordingly.
For this to happen, those who mark papers must get out of their present mind set and be more accomodative.
It is high time the Minstry of Education and the English Departments of universities paid attention to this problem.
Wilfred Fonseka
Colombo
Down to Earth
What will be the future of the capitalist world?
by Derrick SchokmanAs we enter the penultimate year of the 20th century and look back, two profoundly significant events come to mind.
Firstly, the collapse of communism in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Secondly, the spread of the market economy in the third world.
The two events are related, in the sense that the death of command economics fostered economic reform in the third world by weakening the thrust of political forces which had drawn on the communist model for inspiration.
There are different types of capitalism in operation in America, Europe, Japan and East Asia among others. But one element common to all is the separation in the realms of politics and economics to a high degree.
In communism the political and economic realms are one and the same. The state exercises claim over resources in non-market ways, leaving little scope for voluntary economic arrangements.
In capitalism by contrast each of these realms has its own role. There is the private sector to determine what goods and services are provided in a competitive market. And the state which can participate in the market as buyer or seller, or more often as a regulator, but in such a way as not to usurp the price system entirely.
In capitalism the market economy is expected to provide greater wealth and enhance living standards. The axiom is so deep rooted that governments are called to account when growth rates drop as low as 2 percent.
The response of these governments is to try and increase the growth rate by furthering the open market economy, either by their own choice or on the directions of international organisations like the World Bank, IMF and WTO which control aid to the third world.
Third world countries have grown increasingly dissatisfied with the manner in which international institutions operate to promote rich-nation policies to the advantage of powerful multinationals.
Private capital goes to where profits are highest and not necessarily where policies are best suited for third world countries.
Globalization of the financial system has institutionalised instability on a grand scale. Asian currencies have collapsed, Japan has gone into cardiac arrest, Russia is bankrupt, and even Wall Street is down.
These uncertainties in the capitalist system can carry the seeds of its own destruction. Not in the Marxist sense, but by creating an increasing reluctance to tolerate the instability and change caused by the business cycle, leading to "de-industrialisation" and falling employment in manufactures. They could bring about a retreat from the open market and a return to tariffs and other forms of protection.
It is unlikely that democratic countries will abandon capitalism as an act of policy because of these uncertainties. But is quite conceivable that they will shift the boundaries between political decentralisation and economic centralisation to cancel out contrary forces.
Not just third world countries, but wealthy in-dustrialised countries in the west too, which will be challenged by the prospect of faster growth in Eastern Europe and the third world acting as a threat to their low and medium-tech manufacturers.
Rapid development in East Asia has already caused much tension over trade in America and the European Community.
America’s large bilateral trade deficit with China is a factor that weighed heavily on the debate about what tariffs to set on China’s exports.
The European community has been inexcusably slow in allowing reforming countries in Eastern Europe liberal access to community markets.
Opponents of America’s free trade policy agreement with Mexico wax eloquent about the threat to America’s manufacturers.
We can expect such pressures to continue into the next century. The challenge will be to meet the centripetal forces of economics with the centrifugal forces of politics in such a way as to stimulate economic efficiency, growth and equitable income distribution, while at the same time maximising democratic representation and local autonomy many nobel prizes await those who can resolve the issue.
I am sure everybody who lives in and around Katugastota and thousands of people who pass the Katugastota Town daily will join me to express appreciation and gratitude to the Rotary Club of Katugastota who with the magnanimous sponsorship of Mahaweli Reach Hotel, Kandy has made this town area a very pleasant and a very beautiful place by creating a tiny, yet a lovely park along the bank of Mahaweli River which flows right across the town. (It would be more beautiful if the few wooden demarcation poles which serve no purpose and which is an eyesore are removed.)
But it’s indeed a sorry sight to behold the heaps of garbage thrown to the river bank by the side of the main entrance of St. Anthony’s College. Discarded polythene bags, remnants of food and even the withered flowers offered by devotees at the nearby temple are haphazardly thrown which in a single downpour would be washed down to the river, polluting the water which is used by the people of the area for bathing, washing and sometimes for drinking purposes as well. In addition to environment pollution, this is a major health hazard for those who use the river water. It should be noted that an epidemic of cholera is raising its ugly head in and around Kandy.
Another stinking place is just opposite the main entrance of the Government Hospital, Katugastota, which is a garbage collecting centre of Kandy Municipal Council. I can remember that a couple of years back there was a concrete enclosure with an iron lid into which garbage was dumped in this place. But now that enclosure is no more. Garbage is just thrown into this spot. Stray dogs and crows scatter most of these garbage all over the place, spreading germs throughout the area which houses the maternity unit of the hospital just a hop and a jump away from this place.Hence seeing is believing, let anybody who is somebody in the Kandy Municipal Council visit these places and check the veracity of the facts stated above and take early appropriate action to relieve the helpless people of this tantalizing agony.
Lionel de Silva
Katugastota
