‘Before you study the economics, study the economists!’
e-Con e-News 03-09 April 2022
The Rains are Here! A Happy New Year!
Importers are Protesting! The US & EU & England & India are Protesting! Colombo 7 is Protesting! The People too are Protesting! Who shall Prevail? This ee unearths the origins and role, of the US government’s International Monetary Fund (IMF), in world wars, in their deepening of debt bondage. Their culture of conspicuous consumption to frustrate industrialization and undermine Sri Lanka’s independence is key to understanding how we got here and where we go next (see ee Focus).
• The US demand for military bases in Sri Lanka is spurring their ongoing destabilization (political & economic) of the country, and the region.
US Assistant Secretary for South & Central Asian Affairs Donald ‘Banana2’ Lu (Kaplan), who accompanied US Political Undersecretary ‘Maidan Sniper’ Nuland to Sri Lanka on March 21, stands accused of staging the coup against Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan, forcing him out.
The US blames Khan for his ‘stubborn refusal to set up US military bases in Pakistan’, for the US to wage war on the region, on China and Russia in particular. Nuland and Lu then went to India and Bangladesh, where they demanded both countries oppose Russia and China, before landing in Sri Lanka, immediately escalating anti-government protests.
The US has kept demanding military bases in Sri Lanka, even prior to the English granting nominal independence in 1948, with their Queen still the head of state. The US increased pressure, especially after Prime Minister SWRD Bandaranaike kicked out English military bases in 1957. SWRD’s refusal to grant these bases to the USA factored into his assassination in 1959. The US then grabbed Diego Garcia (see: How Sri Lanka Became a US Colony in 1948, ee 25-31 October 2020; Sinophobia & US Demands for Military Bases in Sri Lanka, ee 23-29 May 2021).
President JR Jayawardene’s plan to hand over the Trincomalee tank farm (oil bunkering) to the US, pointed to the US military grabbing at famed Gokanna port. This provided the India government with a pretext to fund, train and arm terrorism. The subsequent imposition of the deeply offensive Indo-Lanka Accord demanded India’s entry into Trincomalee. The accord was never fully implemented, with the LTTE refusing to hand over weapons. So now?
‘The coup attempt in Pakistan unfolded as per an Anglo-US script. PM Imran Khan claimed to have documentary evidence to show that the senior-most official in the US state department dealing with the region, Assistant Secretary of State for South & Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu, had sent to him a threatening message via the Pakistani ambassador in Washington that his time was up in Islamabad as PM… The letter from Washington dated one day before the motion, stated, ‘Pakistan would be forgiven if Imran Khan lost the No Confidence motion!’ Washington had foreknowledge of events in Islamabad.’ (ee Sovereignty, US Ousts)
Assistant Secretary Banana2 Lu and top US State Department officials also met with the Global Tamil Forum (GTF, a group banned in Sri Lanka) a week ago, to discuss ‘democracy, human rights, and economic challenges in Sri Lanka’. At the same time, Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmaniyam Jaishanker met the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in Colombo. Jaishanker, using the current economic meltdown largely exacerbated by the US and India, has taken over key Sri Lankan real-estate: Sampur at the mouth of strategic Trincomalee, the lucrative Mannar basin (with oilfields), and Colombo Port’s West Terminal. The curfew and media shutdown was also demanded by India after they accused the JVP of ‘falsely’ divulging that 6,000 Indian troops had landed here (Random Notes).
From Nandikadal to Nandalal: The new Central Bank Governor Nandalal Weerasinghe worked for the IMF and ‘global investment firms’. Media quotes him as saying, ‘The Central Bank of Sri Lanka is accountable and responsible to the people not a political party’. The issue is, which people? Does he live in a village among the salt of this earth. Does he take the bus or train to work?
The IMF no longer explicitly demands privatization of education and healthcare. Nowadays, they are all about removing energy subsidies. IMF policies are also highly destructive to industries. Without industrialization, the economy would be undermined, and all social services underfunded. The new governor has to tail behind the dictates of the whites. He has hiked interest rates, to starve industries of credit. Instead we have ‘fake’ industries, which import most of their inputs. They already have enough credit, and refuse to invest in modernizing their industries. After all, they are rentiers (making money out of imports, money & land) not entrepreneurs (a word frequently abused by the media). This ee Focus provides fascinating insights into Sri Lanka’s economy and current turmoil.
US envoy Julie Banana1 Chung & her handlers Maidan Nuland, Banana2 Lu, etc., are all delighted of course at our renewed genuflection before their altar of import consumption. Talks with the IMF are ‘extremely urgent’, jointly insists the European Union, envoys of EU Member States (Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania), Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, and, last but not the least, England. Look at the them! as Malcolm X reminded, ‘When they hear the N-word, they all run in the same direction.’ In this case it’s the IMF-word… and see how they gush!
And here’s why: ‘Capitalists import half a trillion rupees of their machinery every year. And Rs1.5 trillion of fuel, vehicles and garment inputs every year. Rs2 trillion in total. When the procurements were made in public sector institutions for machinery, EU standards were made a requirement… Although we have workers who could produce the same machinery, they cannot sell their products to public sector institutions because of these so-called EU standards. We import potatoes from Germany and the Netherlands. Apples and pears from France, grapes from Italy. In 2018 Sri Lanka imported $18.7billion, mostly inessential goods. Any attempt at government regulations on useless imports was criticized as North Korean or Chinese-inspired! Any attempt to discuss making machines here is never allowed in the media.’ (eesrilanka.wordpress.com/2020/12/05/a-war-economy-is-inevitable)
• The ‘popular’ cry, according to the capitalist media, is: ‘Go Home, Gota’ and ‘Go to the IMF’. How did the IMF get so beloved, and why go there again when we’ve been in the IMF embrace for all of our existence as a so-called independent country? The cry for the President to go home refers not to his abode in Mirihana, but to the US, where he retreated after the Indian assassination of 2 popular Brigadiers, and several top soldiers in 1992, on the verge of defeating a terrorist enemy.
The IMF’s home also happens to be in the USA. The IMF was spawned by the US government and its Treasury. And so was Sri Lanka’s Central Bank, which has almost always opposed our independence, despite having the highest amount of PhDs per square foot in the country.
See: Central Bank Special (ee 10 August 2019), A Spectre Haunts the Central Bank & the Home Market (ee 6 June 2020), Make the Central Bank Independent of Capitalism (ee 27 June 2020)
• It is the US Treasury who ‘lent’ us the first governor of the Central Bank, John Exter. Exter, member of the US Federal Reserve System’s Board of Governors, sent an ‘independent’ Sri Lanka reeling into an orgy of consumption: He blew all our sterling balances, (accumulated from their 2nd War on the World) and rubber profits (from their war on Korea), on untrammelled consumption imports. To play act, to mimic and live the life of the white man. Not the white man who genocided the now-settler-dominated countries of the USA, Canada, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Occupied Palestine, etc, and set up parallel industrial countries. Rather, the type who infested non-settler countries, who was here to make a quick buck and make a quick exit, leaving devastation in their trail.
This high consumption culture was accelerated by Japan’s imminent invasion of Ceylon (ee Media, A Most Dangerous Moment), as well as to buy the support of the Sri Lankan people. The Red Armies of China’s Mao Zedong and USSR’s Joe Stalin were smashing imperialist, Nazi and fascist forces in Europe and Asia. The Quit India movement against the English was in full force. Free education, rice and cloth rations, alongside wage settlements, price controls and guaranteed prices for cultivators, import restrictions, etc. were granted and imposed by English colonialism, to save its white ass. (see, Those Dangerous Moments: How England Saved Itself in Ceylon, ee 29 June 2019)
Indeed, as our guru SBD de Silva, to whom ee is dedicated, always asked, how long this orgy (of over-consumption) could last? He always stated, that at this rate, austerity and a war economy is inevitable. He pointed to England’s ‘Internal Purchase Scheme’ in Sri Lanka during their World War 2. The people of this country can only survive this by launching a renewed cultural and industrial revolution. We should also move the capital out of the clutches of the Colombots, to Anuradhapura!
For those who wish to know some of ee’s record on current issues:
The Missing Children of 1956 (ee 31 August 2019)
Who Rules? The State or the Import Merchants? (ee 28 March 2020)
Is the Orgy of the Oligarchs Over Yet? (ee 11 April 2020)
The Ghost of Philip Gunawardena & the Cry for a Cultural Revolution (ee 8 August 2020)
How Sri Lanka Became a US Colony in 1948 (ee 31 October 2020)
IMF Threats, IFC Munificence & the Anti-Investment Trader Mafia in Sri Lanka (ee 16 Jan 2021)
Mafia & Media Hitmen: Multinationals & Import Monopolies (ee 15 May 2021)
Maharaja’s MTV, Chettiar Bankers & Killer Import Mafia (ee 17 July 2021)
Import-Export Mafia, Drug Lords, Media Barons & Flexible Workers (ee 11 Dec 2021)
The IMF: Import Mafia Fundamentalists (ee 18 Dec 2021)
Contents:
A1. Reader Comments
• ee Reeling • No Exam Paper, Posters Galore • Tribal Gnanakka & Liberal Jerome • IMF & Privatisation • Fake Shortages, Fake News • Ukraine Doctors War Crimes • Laziness & Media Lies
A2. Quotes of the Week
• Sri Lanka’s Gun Tech • Indian Oil & Fake Queues • JVP & Anonymous Leaders • Money Changers Deeper Under • Sarvodaya & Executive • IMF Hides its Bitter Meds • SL Debts & Bond Holders • Investors, Political Clarity & IMF • Bloomberg Can’t Name Bond Holders • US Advises Caution • Nationalism & BJP
A3. Random Notes
• JVP, Indian Invasion, & Media Censorship • US Diplomats & Oil Wars • Imran, Courts & the Masses • Blatant Private Sector Corruption • Conspicuous Rural Consumption Culture • Wildass Importing or Money Printing? • Investing in Modern Production? • Seizing Hoards of rice and food • An Immediate Economic Program • MAS & Hemas & US & EU All love Protests • US Envoy at US Senate Foreign Relations Committee • Frustrating a modern industrial country • NATO War on Russia Planned Long Ago • IMF & US Sanctions • • Blackrock & the NATO war against Europe and Germany • Michael Ondaatje’s Gratiaen Award & Anglomania
B. ee Focus
B1. Roots of the 2022 Economic Turmoil – Shiran Illanperuma
B2. NATO War on Russia Planned Long Ago. Repudiate Bad Debts! – Michael Hudson
B3. An Immediate Economic Program for Sri Lanka – Kasun Thilina
C. News Index
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A1. Reader Comments
ee thanks Readers who send articles of interest. Please excerpt or summarize what is important about any news sent, or your comments, and place any e-link at the end. Email: econenews@gmail.com
• ‘Left reeling. Yet again.’
• ‘In this time of paper shortage, where do all these protestors’ posters come from? No paper for exams. Some newspapers reducing their output, etc. I’m beginning to wonder if something else is happening here. Or is it just that things are so well organized by now that they are being produced on the ground and distributed? So many seem to be written by the same hand. Or am I just getting paranoid?’
• O Tribal Gnanakka, O Liberal Jerome – As Sinhala people, we always have a hinamanaya (inferiority complex) when we compare ourselves with other communities. Gnanakka is the best case in point. She is a Sinhala elder who wears a white sari and invokes blessings from ‘the gods’. A product of our Sinhala culture. In any rural area you will find a lesser-known Gnanakka. We publicly laugh at people who go to her. Do we laugh at people who go to the born-again evangelist Jerome? So-called Sri Lankan liberals leading the anti-government protests are now so proud when Muslims joining the protests started praying on the street, and break fast inside Independence Hall. We consider people like Sangakkara as super liberals and ask our youngsters to follow them. But we ridicule those who go to Gnanakka?’
• ‘Does the IMF directly say to privatize education, health sectors or railway? Or do they suggest to implement policies to attenuate these sectors? I googled for IMF documents but couldn’t find them. Thank you for your continuous effort. It is much appreciated.’
• ‘During times of crisis and war, in all countries, shortages are always artificially manipulated to drive up prices while also secretly hoarding. As ee exposed, Cartels always make extra profits while people suffer extra… All these powerful long-brewing worldwide forces can hardly be blamed on one man or family – tho that’s of course the easiest spin, vs critical learning to understand complex historical structural contradictions.
History like a centuries’ mess of intertangled knots – so now if one string is pulled, even with best intentions, there seems no way of knowing what chaos could be wrought… What happens when different uncountable strings are pulled in so many directions?? Yet most analysis (if any) is presented, oversimplified, as a single thick rope, to hang scapegoats or bystanders by.
Now on the brink of World War 3 or 4? Propaganda, fake news, is further manipulated by (anti) ‘social media’. AI recognizes emotions like anger, then algorithms take over, echo, to exponentially spiral, spin and spread rage into uncontrollable hysteria, bringing distant wars home, dividing families & families, nations, worlds…’
• ‘We in Sri Lanka are used to having seen wild allegations against the local security forces, based on manufactured and doctored video and other evidence, at the time of our conflict. Could something similar be happening in the Ukraine?’
• ‘There is always propaganda by ‘both sides’. But this argument – and our underlying wish to get a balanced view – is used to make us dismiss a mountain of evidence in favour of one view against a pebble for the opposite. The pebble can ‘balance’ and sometimes overwhelm the mountain, if controllers of channels of information choose to amplify its size /weight /value.
We learnt about these techniques during the local conflict in Sri Lanka. The difference in nature, scale and virulence of the violence inflicted by the two sides was vastly different. But the lesser was amplified on the global stage. Even worse, evidence against one side was manufactured and made ‘true’ by global media owners. The uncritical target consumers went along with the narrative of the controllers of global mainstream and social media. We are all guilty of the laziness lying beneath this tendency.
For example, it appears crazy to me that corpses were left strewn in a Ukraine city, days after the Russians withdrew. In which culture are one’s dead allowed to remain on the street? Even a dead cat is not left lying around like this – and not only for hygiene reasons. Did residents let their country-folks’ corpses simply lie there for days? This story is believed partly because we can’t imagine how such a scene could have been set up for the media. Decent humans find the first easier to digest. The same applied to various manufactured accounts of atrocities by one side in Sri Lanka. Those with no compunctions can win. We learnt this the hard way, but few remember.’
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A2. Quotes of the Week_
• ‘Sri Lankan guns – The provenance study on the 2 wall-guns which translated into maha thuvakku… by historical firearms specialist Chamikara Pilapitiya… unearths new knowledge about the cutting-edge technology claimed by the Kandyan weapons designer. The arms, replete with woodwork and engraved motifs, recognisable as Kandyan, represent a unique and early Sri Lankan tradition in gunmaking and warfare.’ – ee Media, Solving
• ‘Calls for probe into controversial Indian Oil Co Diesel Deal: Large stocks of both diesel and petrol are available at the Kolonnawa and Muthurajawela storage tanks, but they are not efficiently delivered to filling stations… Kolonnawa and Muthurajawela are the main distribution points, whereas sufficient storage facilities are maintained at district level to meet the demand… Palitha urged the government to inquire into the inordinate delay in delivering both petrol and diesel against the backdrop of the controversial agreement with Lanka IOC to obtain diesel. Claiming that the CPC continued to suffer staggering losses due to the agreement reached several months ago… Cash-strapped CPC paid as much as Rs79 more on each litre of diesel bought from the LIOC storage in Trincomalee than the retail litre price of a at Ceypetco stations. The losses are mounting… Commenting on the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) directly seeking Indian intervention to procure a consignment of diesel to provide uninterrupted electricity during the Sinhala & Tamil New Year period, Palitha said that the government should be ashamed of this development.’ – ee Industry, Unionist
• ‘The JVP has also ‘cautioned against protest campaigns that cannot be traced back to a recognizable and accountable organizer or group’. While acknowledging ‘the people’s right to organize their own protests against Sri Lanka’s worsening economic crisis,’ the JVP has warned of ‘dangers lurking in a protest movement that has no accountability’.’ – Philip, ee Politics
• ‘With some moneychangers coming under fire from regulators, business is shifting to the underground mafia operators, market sources said. Banks are also facing severe problems with counterparty limits cut not just for credit but also for other transactions like cross-currency swaps. Banks are unable to engage in cross-currency swaps, and Sri Lanka letters of credit are losing currency, financial sources said.’ – ee Economy, 315
• ‘Firstly the political parties and the party politics, and secondly the Executive Presidency; both these structures should be abolished. Thirdly the independence of the Judiciary should be maintained. Fourthly all the appointments in ministries and Government institutions such as Central Bank of Sri Lanka, Treasury, etc, should be managed by non-political, non-partisan persons, and all political appointees should be sent home. Lastly, the religious institutions headed by Buddhist Sanga should undergo a radical change. – AT Ariyaratne, Sarvodaya’s Supreme Leader
• ‘Staff Report of the IMF’s Article IV Consultation released last month… What it doesn’t pay much attention is to emphasise the necessary policy reforms to accelerate export growth and FDI inflows.’ – ee Economists, Abeyratne
• ‘Sri Lanka is Asia’s largest high-yield bond issuer, borrowing heavily in the years following the end of its 2009 civil war. It has never defaulted. But it looked set to do so before it turned to the IMF. About one-third of its debts are owed to international bondholders… It is expected to finalise a $1 billion credit line with India. Even with IMF money, it will probably have to default and ‘restructure’ its debts with creditors. In doing so, Sri Lanka will join countries such as Suriname, Belize, Zambia and Ecuador that have already defaulted on their debts during the pandemic. Pakistan too is on the brink of default, with its government under Imran Khan forced into calling elections. Egypt has also asked for support from the IMF.’ – ee Economists, Roberts
• ‘Recent unrest and political uncertainty mean any investor now is attempting to catch a falling knife. We think most investors will wait on more political clarity and evidence of an IMF deal, which does improve recovery values, before taking the plunge into local assets.’ – Charlie Robertson, global chief economist at Renaissance Capital, ee Economists
• ‘Bloomberg’s search for top [SL’s ISB] holders includes holdings of passive funds, such as ETFs, which have little choice in what they buy or sell… Bloomberg’s data doesn’t necessarily include holdings by investors that aren’t required to disclose their debt transactions.’ – ee Economists
• ‘US advisory warned its citizens who are here to avoid the areas of rallies or demonstrations, exercise caution in the vicinity of large gatherings or protests, and to monitor local media for updates’ – ee Security, Economic
• ‘’They are called Hindu nationalists but it’s a bit problematic to call them nationalists at all. They never fought for India’s freedom. They collaborated with the English, openly advocated supporting the English. No one from their whole pantheon of icons went to jail. The only one in jail was Savarkar and he wrote 5 mercy petitions begging the English to free him. In return he swore loyalty to them forever. The only thing he did was organise a plot to kill Mahatma Gandhi and spread hatred against Muslims. This is what is continuing today.’ – ee Media, Patwardhan
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A3. Random Notes (‘Seeing Number in Chaos’)_________________
• Social Media Censorship? Indian media outlet News18, linked to England’s Sky TV, and US media behemoth Comcast, headlined: ‘In Fake Whatsapp Forward, Sri Lanka’s Left Radical JVP Claims Indian Army Arrived in Colombo, Govt Denies… JVP has been spreading false information that the Indian Army has arrived in Colombo to assist the beleaguered Gotabaya Rajapaksa government in the island nation. Fishing in the troubled waters, JVP spread a Whatsapp message, which was widely shared across Sri Lanka, claims about 6,000 Indian soldiers have already arrived in Sri Lanka to quell the protests of the people against the government over economic hardships. The fake message had pictures of an Indo-Lanka joint military exercises ‘Mitrashakti’ conducted last October, claiming it to be the latest. An alarmed Sri Lankan Defence ministry has issued a clarification calling it fake news.
Following this, Chair of the Information & Communication Technology Agency Oshada Senanayake has stepped down. Earlier today, the Ministry of Technology confirmed that it restricted access to social media in Sri Lanka on the request of the Defense Ministry. Meanwhile, Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Gopal Baglay has also issued a statement explaining how India is helping the island nation economically. India has responded to urgent requests from Sri Lanka with promptness. Since this January, support from India to Sri Lanka exceeds US$2.5billion. Baglay told [India’s] ANI: In the 1980s, during the height of Tamil Eelam war the same JVP was busy whipping up anti-India sentiments, spreading fake news. It had put the lives of many Indians living in Sri Lanka at risk. To prevent the spread of fake news Sri Lankan Government has banned all social media platforms except WhatsApp.’ (news18.com/news/world/in-fake-whatsapp-forward-sri-lankas-left-radical-jvp-claims-indian-army-arrived-in-colombo-govt-denies-4937102.html)
• Biographical data is scant about US Assistant Secretary for South & Central Asian Affairs Donald ‘Banana2’ Lu. His father is said to be ‘Chinese’, and mother Jewish (Kaplan). Kaplan-Lu was US ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, 2018-21, and to Albania from 2015-18. In Albania, Kaplan-Lu was accused of being an ‘an operative of billionaire George Soros’, after he asked Albania’s General Prosecutor to stop a criminal investigation into Bankers Petroleum (BP). A BP explosion had damaged 200 houses in Patos-Marinëz, Fier in 2015. BP, Albania’s largest company, is an offshore incorporated and Canada-based oil company, given exclusive exploration and extraction rights in the Patos-Marinëz, where crude oil was first discovered in 1926, the biggest on-shore oilfield in Europe.
Calling Kaplan-Lu an agent of Soros is a diversion. Soros has been accused of staging many a ‘color revolution’ (as taking place in Sri Lanka right now). Soros’ caricaturing diverts from the actual daily workings of the US government. US foreign officials are predominantly former (or covert) employees of Rockefeller’s Exxon Corporation. In Canada, eg, almost all Prime Ministers have been employees of Rockefeller’s oil octopus (Montreal’s Power Corp, eg). The Rockefeller & Ford Foundations need no lessons in playing good cop (soft power) or bad cop (violence, germ warfare, etc.).
As ee (29 Dec 2018) noted: ‘Trump’s first Secretary of State Tillerson was an Exxon CEO. Senate investigators found Exxon was using Washington’s Riggs Bank to funnel hundreds of millions of dollars to the head of Equatorial Guinea, with its enormous gas and oil reserves. Exxon also paid for the children of high-ranking government officials to study in the US. In 2010 Congress included new disclosure regulation, Rule 1504, in the Dodd-Frank legislative reforms on banks. Exxon CEO Tillerson argued against it, but it was approved. In 2017 Exxon lobbyists got Congress and Senate to rescind Rule 1504. Almost exactly an hour later, Tillerson was confirmed as US Secretary of State.’ – http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/16/rex-tillerson-at-the-breaking-point
Kaplan-Lu in Albania claimed that the people from Fieri, ‘are sometimes angry that they do not see the benefits of such a rich source of oil and gas wealth. My colleagues from the US State Department want to support your efforts to create a regulatory & legal framework that will help the Albanian people get the most out of their oil and gas. US companies have long recognized Albania’s oil and gas potential, but say the legal & business environment has made investment difficult. Corruption, contract sanctity, and bureaucratic paperwork are problems often cited… we welcome your commitment to improve conditions for fair competition with high environmental & ethical standards.’
The projection of Asian ‘bananas’ (yellow on the outside, white on the inside) like US envoy Julie Chung in Colombo and Donald Lu on to the world stage (as ‘State Department KneeGrows’), camouflages the rising violence against majority peoples of the world who are called ‘minorities’ in such imperialist countries. The violence is not new, and the sword of genocide (recalled in Exclusion Acts, Concentration Camps) dangles constantly over their heads. Hollywood and TV of course spread mere electronic glitter over their true slavishness.
• Former Pakistan PM Imran Khan is appealing to the Supreme Court. He is also calling on the masses to show their opposition to the US coup – a better option. Our judicial officials and top leadership in all branches of government and the economy are almost fully integrated into the white system of exploitation. They hide their money in those countries (to their detriment, as witnessed in the ongoing trial of a Rajapaksa relative, former Sri Lanka Ambassador Jaliya Wickramasuriya whose sentencing has been postponed to July so as to hold it over the family’s heads). Our officials and ruling classes’ children live, study and work in the white countries. These comprador elites cannot see the world beyond the excreted glitter of Hollywood, etc.
• A chance meeting on a train with a former private insurance-company worker divulged important insights into the economy. Responsible for the physical movement of money between branches and banks, he witnessed for 38 years the blatant corruption of the private sector – of the suits and ties who, he said, have to live by drugs cos they are so deceitful and unhealthy. Some may argue this is psychic exaggeration – ressentiment – to compensate for his still impoverished existence.
Yet he dated Sri Lanka’s accelerated deterioration from the destruction of nascent industry in 1977. He also claimed his Tamil bosses were more egalitarian because they needed wider worker support, whereas his Sinhala overseers, who took over after July 1983, were more profligate. Originally from a rice-growing village he still maintain his rural links. His second insight was the reluctance of the children of cultivators to continue in agriculture. He saw this, rightly or wrongly, in the decision to take young women from villages into the garment factories. Here, he claimed they had acquired ‘fashion sense’ and become ashamed of men who wore amuday in the fields!
• Conspicuous consumption is linked to the spread of imports through Lalith Athulathmudali’s Mahapola schemes, pushing imported goods on the rural areas in the 1980s.Also, to the export of rural workers to West Asia. The long war against terrorism. Conspicuous consumption has now been injected throughout Sri Lankan society. The culture of production, particularly industrial production, has been almost erased. The white media is carefully manipulating the current struggles to promote corruption as the root of the crisis, that if we bring back the dollars stolen from the country, and get the white man to send us more, people can go back to their orgy of consumption, ‘to live their normal lives’. The babbling for even more imports and such consumption is meant to blunt the true potential of the expanding mass struggles must be opposed whenever possible. The presence of car importers and fake garment industrialists must be viewed as more white humor.
ee Focus below examines again the destruction of a ‘producer culture’ in Sri Lanka and the imposition of a consumer culture, the Unilever-Maharajah Sirasa superstar culture of sex, drugs & rock’n’roll, of wine, women & song, of bottle, babe & baila.
• Wildass Importing or Money Printing? Or Investing in Modern Production? Capitalists are hoarding, creating artificial shortages, hiking prices, promoting scarcity and scares, financing wars, using pandemix and supply-chain pandemonia, deploying their media, social and anti-social, to blame corrupt politicians , etc. Seizing the hoards of rice & food, and a simple distribution system is urgently needed. Nationalizing banks in order to invest in long-term modern industrial production is of course key. Ultimately, the only way impoverished countries can reduce their exploitation by multinationals and international finance is through state control of our banking and strategic sectors of our economies. That, of course, would be terrifying to international capital. Their social and anti-sociil media networks will scream!
• White Media – It is clear that both media and ‘social media’ are attempting to promote chaos while claiming to want ‘change’. Chaos can only maintain the status quo. When MAS – the great ‘garment’ importer/exporter – that robbed Thulhiriya, and Hemas that prevented local pharma production, issue press releases calling for ‘the right’ to protest, we can only guess who is trying to take greater control. Meanwhile:
– US Senate Foreign Relations Committee: ‘Closely monitoring the situation in Sri Lanka. Out of an abundance of caution…’
– European Union: ‘Concerned by the state of emergency, EU strongly urges Sri Lankan authorities to safeguard democratic rights of all citizens, including right to free assembly and dissent, which has to be peaceful. Challenging times for Sri Lankan people – EU continues to follow situation closely…’
– Sarah Hulton, English High Commissioner: ‘Concerned by reports of the use of force against journalists and protesters, and the recently imposed Emergency Laws. A citizen’s right to protest peacefully is an essential part of democracy.’
– Julie Banana1 Chung, US Ambassador: Sri Lankans have a right to protest peacefully – essential for democratic expression. I am watching the situation closely, and hope the coming days bring restraint from all sides, as well as much needed economic stability and relief for those suffering.’
(sundaytimes.lk/220403/columns/battle-lines-being-drawn-between-angry-people-and-govt-479058.html)
Julie Banana’s testimony for confirmation at the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee reiterated: ‘Sri Lanka is positioned in a strategic location at the heart of the Indian Ocean, and its critical ports with access to global maritime lanes and trading routes play a pivotal role in a free and open Indo-Pacific architecture. This reinforces the necessity for the US to build constructive relationships with Sri Lanka, including with civil society, the private sector, and the Sri Lankan people.’ In that order?
(island.lk/new-u-s-ambassador-to-sri-lanka-reiterates-human-rights-accountability-her-priorities)
• The frustrating of our modern industrialized independence has been the imperialist game for the last 73 years and more. The media babbling about going to the IMF or not, is but a diversion from the main IMF goal, which is against any industrialized independence. One of the tactics in this sabotage has been the profitable pushing of their massive and untenable consumer culture based not on production, but on imports. Yet, the capitalists superficially blame the present gaze into the abyss on ‘money printing’, ‘budget deficits’, etc.
• A war is being waged on the people of this country. A war directed against Sinhala Buddhist people, that has gone on for 500 years and more. A president and government, popularly elected, have faced unprecedented attack from its very inception. The same political and economic system promoting over-consumption culture has always militated against any transformation of the economy. The present leadership is accused of accomplishing the demoralization of national forces, far worse than any terrorism could have wrought.
• Michael Ondaatje’s Gratiaen Award long list was announced this week. The old tired list of anglomaniacs, with some new wannabes. ee finds it quite eerie that this list is announced at the same time as the International Booker Prize (owned by hedge-fund Man-Booker, that profits off plantation economies) announces their final candidates at the London Book Fair on April 7. And why not? Such English literature is always of the same temper. Supine. It syncs with the financial and industrial cycles of the whites. The award is tended by England’s Standard Chartered Bank – the country’s biggest robber of foreign exchange! Who will tell?! Multinationals and their transfer pricing, under and over invoicing, let alone England’s machine industrial revolution are a foreign dialect yet to be learned.
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B. Special Focus____________________________________________
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B1. Roots of the 2022 Economic Turmoil – Shiran Illanperuma
Tracing colonial underdevelopment, incomplete industrialization and misplaced priorities in Sri Lanka
For the first time in the history of the republic, the upper crust of Sri Lankan society has taken to the streets in protest. Or so it seems. Facing unprecedented price hikes and 13-hour power cuts, the comfortable, consumption-driven lifestyle of Colombo’s middle-class has become increasingly untenable. Their anger and sense of betrayal is palpable.
In the upper-middle-class suburb of Rajagiriya, apartment-dwelling white-collar workers, IT and advertising professionals, artists, actors, and comedians, alongside informal sector workers and tuk-tuk drivers, chant “Gota go home!” – referring to Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Many who once condemned unions for disrupting traffic with protests, have taken to the streets themselves, because they are unable to pump petrol. How did the enlightened liberal turn into an anarchist revolutionary overnight?
The deprivation is a multi-class affair, of course. Farmers, fishers, day laborers, self-employed workers, manufacturing workers, white-collar workers and small-business owners have all faced the brunt of inflation. In spite of the cross-class nature of this crisis, international media coverage, including in the New York Times, has focused predominantly on middle-class anxieties, with their slogans, placards and hashtags written in English – a language not spoken by 75% of the population.
Memes on social media advocate ousting all 225 elected MPs. One screamed, “Gota go home, Sajith stay home, Anura don’t even think about it” – referring to the current President, Opposition Leader, and the leader of a left-leaning opposition party, respectively. While seemingly radical, these slogans reflect a deep-seated mistrust of politics itself, which has been cultivating in middle-class consciousness over the last decade. Curiously, this very mistrust of politics allowed Gotabaya – an outsider to the political establishment who presented himself as a technocrat rather than a politician – to come into office in the first place.
Prices soared after the government floated the exchange rate in preparation for an IMF bailout of yet another balance-of-payments crisis. While Africans and Latin Americans have taken a stance against the IMF and austerity, the Sri Lankan middle-class, on the other hand, demand that the President resign because he did not go to the IMF sooner! Placards shared by middle-class protestors on social media include slogans such as “Call the IMF” and “Follow the IMF you stupid”.
“While Africans and Latin Americans have taken a stance against the IMF and austerity, the Sri Lankan middle-class demand that the President resign because he did not go to the IMF sooner!”
For several years, a cluster of Western-funded thinktanks, advocacy groups and big media houses have been grooming a coterie of economists, researchers, and journalists, old and young, to rebrand neoliberalism. Its face is no longer the white-haired, authoritarian, union-busting patriarch as represented by General Pinochet in Chile, or J.R. Jayawardena in Sri Lanka. Rather, it is the young, aspirational, middle-class women and men who champion socially-progressive ‘woke’ causes such as feminism, the LGBTIQ+ movement, and minority rights. Protests articulating raw outrage without an alternative policy, plan, or program, are ripe for cooption by neoliberal ideology and international finance capital, represented by the IMF and comprador merchant capital interests. Sri Lanka appears to be sleepwalking into further turmoil.
Roots of the Crisis – There are two interpretations of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s rise to power in 2019. The first, oft-repeated in Western media, is that the 2018 Easter Sunday bombings that killed 269 people brought issues of national security to the fore of public consciousness, and created a political opportunity for a strongman with a military history like Gotabaya. Indeed, he declared his presidential aspirations just four weeks after these attacks. Gotabaya is seen as an ethno-nationalist leader, who stirred majoritarian hatred against minorities to win the election.
This compelling narrative, peddled by Western media, portrays Sri Lanka as an orientalist powder keg of primordial ethnic hatred, and misses some crucial pieces of the puzzle. A year before the Easter attacks, Gotabaya’s party, the newly formed Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), swept the 2018 local elections with 40.47% of the vote. These elections were held well before ethnicized clashes that occurred across the country months later. The Rajapaksa family’s political comeback (Gotabaya’s brother Mahinda served as President from 2005-15) was written on the wall well before the Easter Attacks.
This is not to say that chauvinism is not an ingredient in the Rajapaksa project, but that its importance is overstated to the neglect of an understanding of class. The second perspective on Gota’s rise to power is that the family’s comeback was initiated less by ethnicized fervor, and more by the neoliberal policies and corruption of the previous government, which had entered into an IMF agreement in 2016. Withdrawals of subsidies on fertilizer and fuel had sparked protests by farmers and fishers across the country – the SLPP’s main voter demographic. A multimillion-dollar bond scam allegedly conducted by the Central Bank governor had dismayed the middle-class which was hopeful for an end to corruption. High indirect taxation had driven up the costs of living for the urban working classes. High interest rates and import liberalization had affected the fortunes of the domestic agricultural and manufacturing sector.
It is in this context that the SLPP ran on a vaguely anti-neoliberal and pro-national-capital campaign, sweeping to a stunning victory in the 2019 Presidential election, and a two-thirds majority in the 2020 parliamentary election. The party, or at least its supporters, also signaled that they would move Sri Lanka out of the orbit of US imperialism by refusing to sign the USA’s Millennium Challenge Compact (MCC), or to reinforce military agreements with the USA. They also promised to thwart Indian ambitions to take control of a terminal at the Port of Colombo, formerly promised to the state-owned port operator.
Botched Industrial Policy – One of the SLPP administration’s early moves in 2019 was to appoint heterodox economics professor WD Lakshman as Governor of the Central Bank. Lakshman’s appointment was poorly received by comprador capitalists and economists at large because he was well known as an ardent critic of the IMF and neoliberal policies. The appointment indicated a modicum of ideological conviction by the government – not for socialism, but for a national capitalist industrialization inspired by the East Asian Tigers growth model.
The Central Bank under Lakshman, alongside the Ministry of Finance under Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, moved swiftly to create a macroeconomic framework favorable to capital accumulation. The previous government’s agreement with the IMF was discontinued. Tax and interest rates were flattened. The exchange rate was fixed. A few imports were restricted. This macroeconomic framework saw corporate profits and stock prices rise, despite the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic reducing real economic activity. Cracks appeared when the country’s institutions, underfunded and weakened since liberalization policies implemented in 1977, were unable to provide a regulatory framework to discipline capital and ensure that the benefits of these policies led to industrialization and increasing wages.
“…an utter failure of the state to manage prices of essentials, either through state-market participation or through top-down price controls.”
The first budget promised the creation of a development bank, and credit quotas to ensure liquidity would be pumped by banks into productive sectors like manufacturing and agriculture. This never materialized. Policies of forced currency conversion, commonly employed in East Asia and Vietnam during industrialization, were bypassed through black markets. Low rates and fixed exchange rates were abused by importers who were hoarding commodities, and exporters who were hoarding their dollars abroad, creating artificial shortages of both. Politically connected merchants bypassed import restrictions through corruption and bribery. Without sound surveillance mechanisms, institutional capacity, and political will, the government could not, and would not, move beyond macroeconomic tinkering.
To make matters worse, soaring prices of food and energy in the wake of the pandemic threatened to deplete import-dependent Sri Lanka’s foreign-currency reserves and send domestic prices soaring. The state-owned Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) – formed when a center-left government nationalized English and US oil monopolies in the 1960s – had little strategic reserve capacity to store oil when prices dropped in 2020. Despite being warned of the inevitable oil price hikes, the CPC was unable or unwilling to enter into forward contracts to manage risk and maintain price stability. Similarly, Sri Lanka’s Paddy Marketing Board, which bought over 20% of paddy production before liberalization, had little market share to challenge the private paddy mill owners who, in an unabashed display of power, announced the price of rice on national TV, in defiance of government-mandated price controls. All of this represented an utter failure of the state to manage prices of essentials, either through state-market participation or through top-down price controls.
As the foreign-currency crisis worsened, little attempt was made to lower consumption and prioritize essentials. Sri Lanka has the highest number of automobiles per capita in South Asia, guzzling enormous amounts of fuel, the country’s single largest import. In spite of fuel shortages, roads remained clogged with traffic. Without rationing, private vehicle owners with large tank capacities were hoarded fuel, while tuk-tuks and motorbikes got far less. Sri Lanka’s closed economy in the 1970s had queues and rationing to ensure that every family at least received some rice. In contrast, today’s crisis has queues but no system of rationing, so those with high incomes can purchase more, while those with meagre incomes go hungry. The neoliberal solution of market-based pricing provides no answer at all without stronger state-market participation.
Finance Capital and Colonial Underdevelopment – In the midst of all this, global finance capital has also played its part. Foreign embassies, including EU representatives, publicly urged the government to lift already too-meagre import restrictions, often ending missives with thinly veiled threats to politicize domestic human rights issues.
“… in reality only 10% of Sri Lanka’s external debt is owed to China. Western banks, financial institutions and hedge funds, held over 40% of Sri Lanka’s external debt.”
Furthermore, credit ratings agencies (CRAs) downgraded Sri Lanka amidst the pandemic, effectively reducing the government’s ability to increase spending or borrow funds to provide relief amid a pandemic-induced recession. While the crisis has been framed as partially caused by the so-called ‘Chinese debt-trap’, in reality only 10% of Sri Lanka’s external debt is owed to China. In fact, predominantly Western banks, financial institutions and hedge funds, held over 40% of Sri Lanka’s external debt — in the forms of International Sovereign Bonds (ISBs) — in 2021. Notably, 70% of Sri Lanka’s ISBs were issued between 2016 and 2019 while the previous government was undertaking IMF reforms. Consequently, Sri Lanka came out with a bigger debt stock and higher debt-to-GDP ratio than when it began the reforms. In response to the worsening foreign exchange crisis, Sri Lankan sovereign bond holders such as BlackRock and Ashmore Group announced that they had hired a legal adviser for potential debt restructuring talks with Sri Lanka. This added to the uncertainty caused by credit rating downgrades.
Sri Lanka’s debt crisis dates further back to the colonial plantation economy it inherited from the British Raj. When Sri Lanka gained dominion status in 1948, the economy was divided into a peasant sector dominated by subsistence agriculture, and an export-oriented plantation sector dominated by cash crops such as tea, rubber and coconut. The country’s first government, on the advice of the World Bank, recklessly squandered foreign-currency reserves while avoiding major industrial investment. By the 1960s, terms of trade began to shift irrevocably, as the export of primary products and raw materials could not sustain the country’s consumption of imported manufactures. Sri Lanka sank into a trade deficit and was pushed into the IMF’s arms in 1965. The attempt at a policy of import-substitution was insufficient and further destabilized by powerful comprador interests, attempted coups, and a youth insurrection. Later, the first OPEC crisis hit the country hard, forcing it into a long bloody period of liberalization characterized by fire-sales of national assets, union-busting, and ethnicized youth insurrections. Since then, Sri Lanka’s trade deficit and debt stock have only grown, alongside a gradual deindustrialization of its economy.
Ironically, members of the very same comprador capitalist class, which arbitraged around the Gotabaya administration’s botched industrial policy, have now been appointed to advise the President in carrying out the coming wave of ‘liberalization’. While neoliberal economists fantasize about fiscal consolidation and perfect competition, the fact is that the very same class of comprador rentiers that benefited from a brief de-liberalization of the economy, will also benefit from liberalization. Only the largest firms in Sri Lanka could survive the IMF-mandated onslaught of high taxes, high interest rates, and high input prices from currency devaluation. These same firms will most likely be the first in line to pick up national assets for cheap in a potential privatization program. Their monopolies will likely expand, and the country’s economic structure, based on unindustrialized agriculture and services, will get weakened even further.
Industrial Policy: Nipped in the Bud – The middle-classes yearn to go back to their old patterns of conspicuous consumption. The working classes yearn for the bare minimum to keep their families fed. The comprador merchant bourgeoise yearn to go back to the easy pattern of buying cheap and selling dear, betting against a depreciating currency. Meanwhile, global finance capital will not allow Sri Lanka, or any other developing country for that matter, to industrialize, preferring to cage it as a captive market. Conscious industrial policy has been nipped in the bud, and the tragedy is that the neoliberal lobby frames it as a failure of industrial policy itself.
Once considered the economic basis for liberal democracy, a strong welfare state, and national sovereignty, it seems the language and policies of industrialization have been erased from the national consciousness of Sri Lankans of all classes and political affiliations. In its place lies a shallow, socially engineered politics of identity, welfarism and anti-corruption, one that poses many questions, but provides few answers. Gota may very well go home, but the contradictions that produced him, and the disciplining hand of international finance capital, are here to stay.
Shiran Illanperuma is a journalist and economic research analyst. He is interested in Marxist political economy and economic history.
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B2. NATO War on Russia Planned Long Ago, Repudiate Bad Debts! – Michael Hudson
It is now clear that today’s escalation of the New Cold War was planned over a year ago, with serious strategy associated with US plan to block NordStream2 [gas pipeline] as part of its aim of blocking Western Europe (‘NATO’) from seeking prosperity by mutual trade and investment with China and Russia…
China’s growth was recognized as posing the Ultimate Terror: prosperity through socialism. Socialist industrialization always has been perceived to be the great enemy of the rentier economy that has taken over most nations in the century since WWI ended, and especially since the 1980s. The result today is a clash of economic systems – socialist industrialization vs neoliberal finance capitalism.
That makes the New Cold War against China an implicit opening act of what threatens to be a long-drawn-out WWIII. The US strategy is to pry away China’s most likely economic allies, especially Russia, Central Asia, South Asia and East Asia. The question was, where to start the carve-up & isolation? [This points to Sri Lanka, too!]
The prospective fall in the Euro-Dollar Exchange Rate – Apart from the US economic conquest of Europe, its strategists are seeking to lock in African, South American and Asian countries along similar lines to what has been planned for Europe…
The IMF has its own policy of sanctioning countries that do not obey US policy. The first US demand will be that these countries boycott Russia, China and their emerging trade & currency self-help alliance. ‘Why should we give you SDRs or extend new dollar loans to you, if you are simply going to spend these in Russia, China and other countries that we have declared to be enemies?’ the US officials will ask.
At least, this is the plan. I would not be surprised to see some African country become the ‘next Ukraine,’ with US proxy troops (still plenty of Wahabi advocates & mercenaries) fighting against the armies and populations of countries seeking to feed themselves with grain from Russian farms, and power their economies with oil or gas from Russian wells – not to speak of participating in China’s Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) that was, after all, the trigger to US launching of its new war for global neoliberal hegemony…
What is in this for the Global South countries being squeezed – not merely as ‘collateral damage’ to the deep shortages and soaring prices for energy and food, but as the very objective of US strategy as it inaugurates the great splitting of the world economy in two? India has already told US diplomats that its economy is naturally connected with those of Russia and China.
From the US vantage point, all that needs to be answered is, ‘What’s in it for the local politicians and client oligarchies that we reward for delivering their countries?’
That is what makes the looming World War III a veritable war of economic systems. What side will countries choose: their own economic interest and social cohesion, or the US diplomacy put in the hands of their political leaders along with US meddling along the lines of the $5billion that Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland bragged of having invested in Ukraine’s neo-Nazi parties 8 years ago to initiate the fighting erupting in today’s war?
(counterpunch.org/2022/04/08/the-dollar-devours-the-euro)
• Blackrock & the NATO war against Europe & Germany (Blackrock hired lawyers to threaten Sri Lanka over its so-called debt via International Sovereign Bonds): ‘BlackRock Inc manages $10trillion dollars in assets, and as such investors tend to place close attention to the views and opinions of chairman and CEO Larry Fink. His recent letter to shareholders states: ‘The Russian invasion of Ukraine has put an end to the globalization we have experienced over the last 3 decades.’
With Saudi Arabia now pursuing talks allowing some of its oil to be priced in the Chinese currency the Yuan, the dominance of the US Dollar as part of the standard for maintaining its power is in jeopardy…
Michael Hudson: ‘The war isn’t against Russia. The war isn’t against Ukraine. The war is against Europe and Germany. The purpose of the sanctions is to prevent Europe and other allies from increasing their trade and investment with Russia and China, because the US saw that the centre of world growth is not in US now that it’s deindustrializing. Following neoliberal policies since the 1980s has ended up hollowing out the US economy… Especially if the global South countries say we are not going to sacrifice our economies & impose austerity just to pay for bondholders; the loans have gone bad, they’re odious loans, we’re repudiating… not paying…’
[ee: of course, our decolonizing countries need to get together to act collectively to properly deal with old imperialist debts]
(defenddemocracy.press/nato-russia-proxy-war-revealing-signs-of-a-fading-america-scott-ritter-michael-hudson)
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B3. An Immediate Economic Program for Sri Lanka – Kasun Thilina
Debt Restructuring
• Begin with ISBs (International Sovereign Bonds, with mostly US banks), as the hardest to restructure
• Bilateral, government-government, debts easier to restructure
• Prepare for Soft default and start discussions for ‘Dubai Guidelines’
Government Revenue
• Increase direct taxation on incomes of the wealthiest
• Land tax
• Automobile taxes (based on the engine)
• Bank revenue tax (bank profits to have a ceiling)
• Stock trade tax
• Productive sectors – manufacturing & agriculture – should be exempt from high taxation wherever possible
White (illegal) markets
• Break the white market system of Hawala and Undiyal
• Differential exchange rate for foreign remittances
• Fast-track implementation of Central Bank Digital Currency, good in achieving this and for collecting tax & data
Food security
• Create and distribute essential commodities packs to be subsidized by Sathosa
• Ensure low rice prices by liquidating warehouse paddy
• Increase state capacity for paddy storage
• Increase market share of Paddy Marketing Board
• Develop data analytics for rice production and consumption patterns
• Establish a digital system for rice distribution
• An Immediate Economic Program:
Debt Restructuring
• Begin with ISBs (International Sovereign Bonds, with mostly US banks), as the hardest to restructure
• Bilateral, government-government, debts easier to restructure
• Prepare for Soft default and start discussions for ‘Dubai Guidelines’
Government Revenue
• Increase direct taxation on incomes of the wealthiest
• Land tax
• Automobile taxes (based on the engine)
• Bank revenue tax (bank profits to have a ceiling)
• Stock trade tax
• Productive sectors – manufacturing & agriculture – should be exempt from high taxation wherever possible
White (illegal) markets
• Break the white market system of Hawala and Undiyal
• Differential exchange rate for foreign remittances
• Fast-track implementation of Central Bank Digital Currency, good in achieving this and for collecting tax & data
Food security
• Create and distribute essential commodities packs to be subsidized by Sathosa
• Ensure low rice prices by liquidating warehouse paddy
• Increase state capacity for paddy storage
• Increase Paddy Marketing Board’s share of the rice market
• Develop data analytics for rice production and consumption patterns
• Establish a digital system for rice[ and other essential foods] distribution
(Kasun Thilina, [economist, 2021 advisor to CBSL])
__________________________________________________________
C. News Index______________________________________________
• ee News Index provides headlines & links to make sense of the weekly focus of published English ‘business news’ to expose the backwardness of multinational, corporate controlled ‘local media’:
C1. Sovereignty
(ee is pro-politics, pro-politician, pro-nation-state, anti-corporatist, anti-expert, anti-NGO)
ee Sovereignty news emphasizes sovereignty as economic sovereignty – a strong nation is built on modern (machine-making) industrialization fueled by a producer culture.
• Indian External Affairs Minister Jaishanker meets Tamil National Alliance (TNA)
‘TNA to receive $ from the Tamil diaspora and Tamil Nadu through North-East Development Fund’
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/columns/battle-lines-being-drawn-between-angry-people-and-govt-479058.html
• TN Chief Minister Stalin proposes New Delhi to send essential supplies to Sri Lanka
‘Tamil Nadu government was prepared to supply essential commodities such as rice, cereals and life-saving drugs by ship from Thoothukudi to benefit Tamils in eastern and northern provinces, and in Colombo and Jaffna and hill-country Tamils, ‘
– timesonline.lk/news-online/TN-Chief-Minister-Stalin-proposes-New-Delhi-to-send-essential-supplies-to-Sri-Lanka/2-1137298
• Indian External Affairs Minister uses protests to push for Pieces & Positons
‘Sampur near Trincomalee, Mannar, ‘technicians’ installed in Lanka’s air and naval bases and and puppet provincial council in the North – all for a billion dollars’
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/editorial/was-it-a-fair-exchange-479051.html
• Jai Hind! Sri Lanka in danger of becoming 29th pranth of India
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/columns/jai-hind-sri-lanka-in-danger-of-becoming-29th-pranth-of-india-478868.html
• Unprecedented controversy: PUCSL bypasses govt., seeks Indian help to ensure power supply
‘Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) comprises Janaka Ratnayake, Prof. Janaka Ekanayake (Deputy Chairman), Chathurika Wijesinghe, Udeni Wickremesinghe and Mohan Samaranayake… The PUCSL has been constituted in terms of the 20th Amendment to the Constitution enacted in Oct 2020 with an overwhelming 2/3 majority.’
– island.lk/unprecedented-controversy-pucsl-bypasses-govt-seeks-indian-help-to-ensure-power-supply/
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-power-regulator-seeks-diesel-from-india-envoy-92666/
• JKH, MAS, Brandix, Expolanka, Hemas, Hirdaramani and Jetwing extend support to protests
– ft.lk/front-page/Top-corporates-speak-up-empower-peaceful-protests/44-733155
• Private sector appeals to Parliament to prioritise political stability
‘All Island Dairy Association; Association of Container Deport Operators; Association of Container Transporters; Ceylon Association of Shipping Agents; Ceylon Chamber of Commerce; Ceylon Motor Traders Association; Colombo Rubber Traders Association; Colombo Tea Traders’ Association; Diamond exporters Association of Sri Lanka; Essential Food Importers and Traders Association; Exporters Association of Sri Lanka; Federation of the Information Technology Industry Sri Lanka; Free Trade Zone Manufacturers Association; Hub Operators Association of Sri Lanka; Industrialists Association Minuwangoda; Insurance Association of Sri Lanka; Joint Apparel Association Forum; Lanka Fruit and Vegetable Producers, Processors and Exporters Association; Leasing Association of Sri Lanka; National Chamber of Exporters of Sri Lanka; Plastics and Rubber Institute of Sri Lanka; Sri Lanka Association for Software and Services Companies (SLASSCOM); Sri Lanka Association of Air Express Companies; Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators (SLAITO); Sri Lanka Association of Manufacturers and Exporters of Rubber Products; Sri Lanka Ceramics and Glass Council; Sri Lanka Logistics and Freight Forwarders Association; Sri Lanka Retailers’ Association; Sri Lanka Shippers Council; Sugar Importers Association; Tea Exporters Association; The Colombo Brokers’ Association ; The Finance Houses Association of Sri Lanka; The Hotels Association of Sri Lanka; The Industrial Association of Sri Lanka; The Planters’ Association of Ceylon; The Sri Lanka Pharmaceutical Manufacturers’ Association; and Travel Agents Association of Sri Lanka (TAASL)’
– ft.lk/top-story/Private-sector-appeals-to-Parliament-to-prioritise-political-stability/26-733172
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Impending-economic-crisis-needs-to-be-resolved-urgently-to-prevent-a-serious-catastrophe-SL-private-sector-says/2-1137294
– themorning.lk/several-chambers-associations-urge-rapid-solution-for-economic-crisis/
• Major private companies call for immediate solution to economic crisis
‘Russel Juriansz said the IMF and the World Bank were of importance to Sri Lanka, based on their effective financial management some years ago…’
– island.lk/major-private-companies-call-for-immediate-solution-to-economic-crisis/
• Some Rajapaksas should be removed – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_3.html
• ‘Gota Go’ is about the complete annihilation of nationalism – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_7.html
• The so-called mass protests and the caretaker government – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_6.html
• From Korea to Koreava or Siddhartha Go – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_8.html
• Sri Lanka People’s Protests & Looming Arab Spring – Waduge
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/02/sri-lanka-peoples-protests-looming-arab-spring/
• Public Protests, Rajapakse Rule & Indo-US manipulations – Waduge
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/06/public-protests-rajapakse-rule-indo-us-manipulations/
• Pohottu as USA Proxy Parts 1 & 2
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/06/pohottu-as-usa-s-proxy-part-1/
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/06/pohottu-as-usa-s-proxy-part-2/
• Russia declares early termination of membership of UN Human Rights Council
– globaltimes.cn/special-coverage/Ukraine-Tensions-Timeline.html
• US-pushed resolution suspends Russia from human rights body, ‘splits UN with partial facts’
‘Russia, China, Iran and Vietnam were among those who voted against. Those who abstained include India, Brazil, South Africa, Mexico, Pakistan and Singapore.’
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258839.shtml
• US Embassy, KDU host conference on “A Shared Vision for the Indo-Pacific”
– island.lk/us-embassy-kdu-host-conference-on-a-shared-vision-for-the-indo-pacific/
• US announces plan to provide additional $7 Million for demining assistance to Sri Lanka
– island.lk/us-announces-plan-to-provide-additional-7-million-for-demining-assistance-to-sri-lanka/
• Our failure to respond to Darusman Report – Wijesinha
– island.lk/letters-from-the-past/
• US Human Rights Watch (HRW) urges IMF address economic rights, corruption in loans:
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Address-economic-rights-corruption-in-loans-HRW-urges-IMF/2-1137281
• UN human rights office urges Sri Lanka to defuse tensions peacefully
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/06/un-human-rights-office-urges-sri-lanka-to-defuse-tensions-peacefully/
• Inaugural session of bilateral political consultations between Sri Lanka and the Netherlands
– island.lk/inaugural-session-of-bilateral-political-consultations-between-sri-lanka-and-the-netherlands/
• Sri Lanka talks with IMF extremely urgent: EU delegation
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-talks-with-imf-extremely-urgent-eu-delegation-92836/
– adaderana.lk/news/81710/sri-lankan-authorities-should-start-in-depth-talks-with-imf-eu
• India puts itself first
‘Stands up to US bullying on Russia, takes far-seeing stance on Ukraine’
– tribuneindia.com/news/comment/india-puts-itself-first-383320
• India’s dilemma over West vs. Russia
– indianpunchline.com/indias-dilemma-over-west-vs-russia/
• Unheeded US warning toward India highlights antipathy of non-Western countries
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258760.shtml
• Pakistan possibly a new victim of US’ political meddling to contain China’s rise
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1257601.shtml
• Pakistan President Dissolves National Assembly on Advice of PM Imran Khan
– newsclick.in/pakistan-president-dissolves-national-assembly-advice-pm-imran-khan
• Pak SC declares dissolution of assembly unconstitutional; Imran Khan faces no-trust vote
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Pak-SC-declares-dissolution-of-assembly-unconstitutional-Imran-Khan-to-face-no-trust-vote-on-Saturday/108-234746
• US ousts Imran Khan but his revolutionary narrative endures
– thecradle.co/Article/columns/8783
• Is Asia Possible? Two words mean so little these days – Asia and solidarity.
– newsclick.in/is-asia-possible
• Hell at Abbey Gate: Chaos, Confusion and Death in the Final Days of the War in Afghanistan
‘Initially, Pentagon leaders told the public that Islamic State gunmen opened fire on civilians and service members. The investigators later determined that wasn’t true. The only shooters they identified were US and English troops.’
– propublica.org/article/hell-at-abbey-gate-chaos-confusion-and-death-in-the-final-days-of-the-war-in-afghanistan
• Iran-backed Houthi is the winner in Yemen
– indianpunchline.com/iran-backed-houthi-is-the-winner-in-yemen/
• Israel reaches out to China, again
– indianpunchline.com/israel-reaches-out-to-china-again/
• US, NATO seek united front with Asia-Pacific allies to isolate Russia, pressure China over Ukraine crisis
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258771.shtml
• New Cold War Neocolonialism: West Threatens Solomon Islands Over China Alliance
‘The Solomon Islands, a sovereign country in the Pacific, broke ties with Taiwan and allied with China. So the US backed a failed violent coup attempt’
– blackagendareport.com/new-cold-war-neocolonialism-west-threatens-solomon-islands-over-china-alliance
• Cold War schemer: Reminiscing in its past ‘victory,’ US brings color revolutions to 21st century to maintain its hegemony
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1257580.shtml
• Pentagon can’t independently confirm atrocities in Ukraine’s Bucha, official says
– reuters.com/world/pentagon-cant-independently-confirm-atrocities-ukraines-bucha-official-says-2022-04-04
• Donbass still remains key battleground (April 3)
– indianpunchline.com/donbass-still-remains-key-battleground/
• Fake news in Kiev heralds cruel April
– indianpunchline.com/fake-news-in-kiev-heralds-cruel-april/
• Ukrainian Tochka-U Missile Killed Dozens At Kramatorsk Train Station
– moonofalabama.org/2022/04/a-ukrainian-tochka-u-missile-killed-dozens-at-kramatorsk-train-station
• The road to Ukraine started with 1999’s Kosovo War
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/the-road-to-ukraine-started-with-1999s-kosovo-war/
• Ukraine This month will decide world politics for next 30+ years
– thedreizinreport.com/2022/03/31/this-month-will-decide-world-politics-for-next-30-years/
• Mapping Faultlines: Rubles, Rupees and Oil Diplomacy
– newsclick.in/mapping-faultlines-rubles-rupees-and-oil-diplomacy
• U.S. Airstrike Killed 11 Libyan Civilians and Allies,
– blackagendareport.com/us-airstrike-killed-11-libyan-civilians-and-allies-human-rights-groups-say
• Burkina Faso’s former president Compaore gets life imprisonment for assassination of predecessor Thomas Sankara in 1987
– radiohc.cu/en/noticias/internacionales/291342-burkina-fasos-former-president-sentenced-to-life-imprisonment
• US Covert Action Exploitation of Cuban Involvement in Angola, 1977
‘After Angola gained independence in 1975, the US exacerbated an already tense civil conflict by beginning covert military operations…’
– blackagendareport.com/document-covert-action-exploitation-cuban-involvement-angola-1977
• Venezuela rejects interventionist statements by Sweden
– radiohc.cu/en/noticias/internacionales/290882-venezuela-rejects-interventionist-statements-by-sweden
• Illegally Imprisoned Venezuelan Diplomat Faces US Court Amid a Shifting Global Context
– blackagendareport.com/illegally-imprisoned-venezuelan-diplomat-faces-us-court-amid-shifting-global-context
• Argentina reaffirms sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands
– radiohc.cu/en/noticias/internacionales/290873-argentina-reaffirms-sovereignty-over-the-malvinas-islands
• UN suspends Russia from Human Rights Council: SL & India abstains from voting
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/UN-suspends-Russia-from-Human-Rights-Council-SL-abstains-from-voting/108-234747
– adaderana.lk/news/81700/public-sector-workers-on-token-strike-today
• Weaponized drones to go to Germany for first time
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258730.shtml
• Canada’s History of Promoting Anti-Russian Ukrainian Nationalism
– socialistproject.ca/2022/04/canadas-history-of-promoting-anti-russian-ukrainian-nationalism/
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C2. Security (the state beyond ‘a pair of handcuffs’, monopolies of legitimate violence)
ee Security section focuses on the state (a pair of handcuffs, which sposedly has the monopoly of legitimate violence), and how the ‘national security’ doctrine is undermined by private interests, with no interest in divulging or fighting the real enemy, whose chief aim is to prevent an industrial renaissance as the basis of a truly independent nation.
• SL army always prepared to provide security & protection to State: General Shavendra Silva
– dailymirror.lk/latest_news/SL-army-always-prepared-to-provide-security-and-protection-to-the-State-General-Shavendra-Silva/342-234469
• Gen. Silva tells Colombo-based defence attaches armed forces complying with Constitution
– island.lk/gen-silva-tells-colombo-based-defence-attaches-armed-forces-complying-with-constitution/
• Army Commander asks IGP for disciplinary action against Police misbehaviour with motorcycle crew
‘’Army Commander who is also the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) shifted the Air Mobile Brigade of the 53 Division to Colombo’
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Probe-underway-over-verbal-clash-between-police-and-army-personnel-near-Parliament/108-234587
– ft.lk/news/Army-Commander-calls-on-IGP-to-conduct-disciplinary-action-against-Police-misbehaviour-with-motorcycle-crew/56-733090
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/05/investigation-into-police-army-riders-confrontation-during-protest-near-parliament/
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/05/police-confront-armed-masked-men-in-unregistered-bikes-at-parliament-protest/
– island.lk/incident-involving-police-and-army-goes-viral-gen-silva-questions-conduct-of-police-demands-inquiry/
– dailymirror.lk/plus/This-is-not-the-time-to-test-the-patience-of-young-protestors/352-234692
• State of emergency is not a solution: BASL
– dailymirror.lk/news-features/Curfew-and-state-of-emergency-Can-suppressive-measures-silence-peoples-voice-any-further/131-234420
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/07/act-as-statesmen-in-the-countrys-hour-of-need-basl/
• State of Emergency: HRCSL criticises govt. decision
– island.lk/state-of-emergency-hrcsl-criticises-govt-decision/
• Embattled Sri Lanka President revokes Emergency Law after losing 42 MPs’ backing
– economynext.com/embattled-sri-lanka-president-revokes-emergency-law-after-losing-42-mps-backing-92608/
• Colombo based Diplomatic corps briefed on prevailing situation in Sri Lanka
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Colombo-based-Diplomatic-corps-briefed-on-prevailing-situation-in-Sri-Lanka/2-1137288
• Economic and political instability in SL, US updates travel advisory
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/US-asks-citizens-to-reconsider-travel-to-SL-in-new-advisory-amid-crisis/108-234729
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Economic-and-political-instability-in-SL-US-updates-travel-advisory/2-1137285
• Lanka’s former envoy faces jail term and fine in US on July 20 this year
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/news/lankas-former-envoy-faces-jail-term-and-fine-in-us-479101.html
• Wartime FM says SL envoy’s conduct disgrace to entire country
‘Controversial payments made to US broker never probed’
– island.lk/wartime-fm-says-sl-envoys-conduct-disgrace-to-entire-country/
• Re-export of radioactive materials for disposal: SLPA urged people not be misled by fake news
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Re-export-of-radioactive-materials-for-disposal-SLPA-urged-people-not-be-misled-by-fake-news/2-1137274
• Indian posing as journalist of HR organization arrested with over Rs11mn drugs
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Indian-posing-as-journalist-of-HR-organization-arrested-with-over-Rs11mn-drugs/108-234734
• US arrests ’Yakuza Chief’ who sought missiles for Sri Lanka rebels
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/US-arrests-Yakuza-Chief-who-sought-missiles-for-Sri-Lanka-rebels/108-234758
• Kandy’s old prison now a no man’s land – L.B. Senaratna
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/06/andys-old-prison-now-a-no-mans-land-by-l-b-senaratna/
• The most dangerous moment – Japanese Fleet was heading for Ceylon
– island.lk/the-most-dangerous-moment/
• US shuns UN meeting on biological security to cover up guilt conscience
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258784.shtml
• Experts Warn Black Sea Mines Pose Serious Maritime Threat
– newsclick.in/experts-warn-black-sea-mines-pose-serious-maritime-threat
• US ‘Intelligence’ Says Its ‘Intelligence’ Is Bullshit
– moonofalabama.org/2022/04/us-intelligence-says-its-intelligence-is-bullshit.html#comments
• Biden Kills the Demand to Defund Police to give Police departments $30 billion
– blackagendareport.com/biden-kills-demand-defund-police
_____________________________________________________________
C3. Economists (Study the Economists before you study the Economics)
ee Economists shows how paid capitalist/academic ‘professionals’ confuse (misdefinitions, etc) and divert (with false indices, etc) from the steps needed to achieve a modern industrial country.
• New Governor Nandalal Weerasinghe stresses need for CBSL independence
‘Weerasinghe was International Monetary Fund’s Alternate Executive Director for India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Bhutan, from January 2010 to August 2012…and then worked for multilateral agencies and Global Investment firms’
– island.lk/new-governor-stresses-need-for-cbsl%e2%80%88independence/
– island.lk/new-cb-governor-and-treasury-secretary-appointed/
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-to-appoint-legal-financial-advisors-for-debt-restructuring-in-2-weeks-92859/
– economynext.com/sri-lankas-new-cb-chief-says-catching-up-with-record-rate-hike-92853/
• Historic monetary policy tightening
“CBSL is accountable and responsible to the people not a political party. I have to live up to public expectations of ensuring CBSL independence and credibility…”
– ft.lk/top-story/Historic-monetary-policy-tightening/26-733283
• New CBSL Chief to fast-track IMF support program, foreign debt restructuring
– ft.lk/front-page/New-CBSL-Chief-to-fast-track-IMF-support-program-foreign-debt-restructuring/44-733281
• Joint Chambers welcome new CBSL, Treasury appointees
– ft.lk/front-page/Joint-Chambers-welcome-new-CBSL-Treasury-appointees/44-733282
• Mahinda Siriwardena made Sri Lanka Treasury Secretary
‘He is an Advisory Board Member of the Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis, Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University’
– economynext.com/mahinda-siriwardena-made-sri-lanka-treasury-secretary-92760/
• CP General Secretary says govt. did not heed their advice
‘Rajapaksa administration continued with the free market economy...’
– island.lk/cp-general-secretary-says-govt-did-not-heed-their-advice/
• Roots of the 2022 Economic Crisis – Shiran Illanperuma
– jamhoor.org/read/is-sri-lanka-heading-towards-further-turmoil
• IMF Surgery and Mr. Ranil – Nalin de Silva
‘The economic problems of any country should be solved by the people of that country’
– gammiris.lk
• Interim government to meet crises needs correct policies – Vitarana
– island.lk/interim-government-to-meet-crises-needs-correct-policies/
• Implementation of CBSL roadmap could’ve brought needed macro-economic stability: Cabraal
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Implementation-of-CBSL-roadmap-could-have-brought-needed-macro-economic-stability-Cabraal/273-234413
• Economic crisis: How did we get here?
‘6bn US$ spent to import fuel, food, and medicines. Remaining 15bn US$ on other imports…’
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/07/economic-crisis-how-did-we-get-here/
• Export-oriented manufacturing incentives needed – Howard Nicholas
– youtube.com/watch?v=hbtA82llKFI&ab_channel=AdaDeranaEnglish
• High powered advisory team to advise President on IMF, debt management
‘Members of the Presidential Advisory Group on Multilateral Engagement and Debt Sustainability are Dr. Indrajit Coomaraswamy, Former Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and Former Director of the Economic Affairs Division of the Commonwealth Secretariat, Prof. Shanta Devarajan, Professor of the Practice of Development, Georgetown University and Former Chief Economist, World Bank and Dr Sharmini Coorey, Former Director, Institute of Capacity Development of the IMF Institute, and Former Deputy Director, Africa Department, IMF.’
– dailymirror.lk/latest_news/High-powered-advisory-team-to-advise-President-on-IMF-debt-management/342-234665
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Eminent-panel-appointed-to-advise-Prez-and-guide-SLs-talks-with-IMF/273-234682
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Members-of-Presidential-Advisory-Group-on-Multilateral-Engagement-and-Debt-Sustainability-appointed/2-1137275
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/lankan-president-asks-experts-to-plan-debt-restructure/
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Private-sector-demands-immediate-action-from-policymakers-as-economic-catastrophe-looms/273-234863
– ft.lk/front-page/Private-sector-warns-crises-causing-50-m-daily-economic-loss/44-733280
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-has-to-act-on-finance-minister-imf-before-economy-falls-off-precipice-chambers-92812/
• Sri Lanka needs ‘bridge financing’ to last next six months, says Indrajit Coomaraswamy
– island.lk/sri-lanka-needs-bridge-financing-to-last-next-six-months-says-indrajit-coomaraswamy/
• Govt. seeks help from WB, ADB and UN
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/news/govt-seeks-help-from-wb-adb-and-un-479095.html
• No Minister of Finance
– ft.lk/top-story/Parliament-slips/26-733158
• Sabry continues as Finance Minister
– island.lk/sabry-continues-as-finance-minister/
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-may-be-able-to-get-us3bn-from-imf-sabry-92837/
• BlackRock, Ashmore part of Sri Lanka’s creditor group ahead of debt talks
‘holds more than 30 percent of the country’s foreign sovereign bonds’
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/BlackRock-Ashmore-part-of-Sri-Lankas-creditor-group-ahead-of-debt-talks/273-234679
• Fidelity Among Big Sri Lankan Debt Holders Staring Down Risk
‘Fidelity, Lord Abbett & Co. and T. Rowe were among the overseas holders of the island nation’s $12.6 billion in foreign debt…’
– bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-05/fidelity-among-big-sri-lankan-debt-holders-staring-down-turmoil
• Tug of war over who should constitute the Sri Lanka delegation to the IMF talks continues.
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/columns/battle-lines-being-drawn-between-angry-people-and-govt-479058.html
• Sri Lanka seeks IMF, World Bank aid to avert debt crisis
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/sri-lanka-seeks-imf-world-bank-aid-to-avert-debt-crisis-478619.html
• Encourage Expat Contribution to Securing and Improving Foreign Reserves
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/concept-of-an-approach-to-encourage-expat-contribution-to-securing-and-improving-foreign-reserves-with-earned-foreign-currency-accounts-as-non-resident-sri-lankans-with-or-without-dual-citizenship/
• Is a national consensus to resolve the economic crisis possible? – Sanderatne
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/columns/is-a-national-consensus-to-resolve-the-economic-crisis-possible-479014.html
• IMF or Not – Abeyratne
‘Sri Lanka entered the international bond market in 2007 and borrowed $17.5 billion in total by 2019; it now accounts for 47 per cent of the country’s total foreign borrowings.’
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/with-or-without-imf-478604.html
• The great inflation debate: Does money matter? – Wijewardena
‘When the former Governor W.D. Lakshman began to increase the money stock in the name of stimulating the economy’
– ft.lk/columns/The-great-inflation-debate-Does-money-matter/4-732953
• SL’s growth to dip amid macroeconomic challenges and external headwinds: ADB
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/SLs-growth-to-dip-amid-macroeconomic-challenges-and-external-headwinds-ADB/273-234678
– ft.lk/front-page/ADB-forecasts-only-2-4-economic-growth-for-SL-in-2022/44-733148
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Sri-Lankas-GDP-growth-projected-to-dip-to-2-4-in-2022-ADB/2-1137267
– themorning.lk/adb-forecasts-sl-gdp-to-dip-to-2-4-in-2022/
• Moody’s says resignations of key officials raise policy uncertainty
– ft.lk/front-page/Moody-s-says-resignations-of-key-officials-raise-policy-uncertainty/44-733147
• Sri Lanka’s finance minister quits after just one day, as economic crisis worsens – Bloomberg
– island.lk/sri-lankas-finance-minister-quits-after-just-one-day-as-economic-crisis-worsens-bloomberg/
• Sabry says Govt. must go to IMF, WB, ADB, Should’ve Gone A Year Ago
– ft.lk/news/Sabry-says-Govt-must-go-to-IMF-WB-ADB/56-733192
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-presidents-close-ally-admits-blunders-on-imf-rupee-debt-restructuring-92753/
– themorning.lk/government-should-have-gone-to-imf-one-year-ago-ali-sabry/
• New CBSL Governor & Finance Secy appointed
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Finance-Ministry-loses-both-Minister-and-Secretary/273-234609
– themorning.lk/new-cbsl-governor-finance-secy-appointed/
• Blamed for current crisis, Monetary Board before House Committee today
– island.lk/blamed-for-current-crisis-monetary-board-before-house-committee-today/
• Ranil says IMF ready to help Sri Lanka overcome crisis
– island.lk/ranil-says-imf-ready-to-help-sri-lanka-overcome-crisis/
• Ranil proposes aid consortium for SL
– ft.lk/front-page/Ranil-proposes-aid-consortium-for-SL/44-733100
• RW reiterates Parliament should take control of public finance
– ft.lk/front-page/RW-reiterates-Parliament-should-take-control-of-public-finance/44-733279
• Behind economic crisis are also Lakshman, Jayasundera, Cabraal, Attygalle: Charitha Herath
– economynext.com/behind-sri-lanka-economic-crisis-are-also-lakshman-jayasundera-cabraal-attygalle-legislator-92800/
• South Asia’s Arab Spring: Protests Amid Hybrid Economic War in Pakistan and Sri Lanka
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/south-asias-arab-spring-protests-amid-hybrid-economic-war-in-pakistan-and-sri-lanka/
• What Sri Lanka’s IMF program should look like – Bellwether
– economynext.com/what-sri-lankas-imf-program-should-look-like-92668/
• Comprehensive proposals to address the current crisis formulated by the IMF: T. Gunasekera
– ft.lk/columns/Pompeii-in-the-Indian-Ocean/4-733054
• Chartered Accountants wants engagement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/CA-Sri-Lanka-calls-for-unity-urges-on-plan-to-resolve-economic-crisis/273-234603
• Is struggling Sri Lanka salvageable? – The Bangkok Post
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/is-struggling-sri-lanka-salvageable/
• Rupee surpasses Russian rouble as world’s worst-performing currency – England’s Financial Times
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Rupee-surpasses-Russian-rouble-as-worlds-worst-performing-currency/273-234680
• Congress warns Modi India faces ‘Sri Lanka like situation’
– island.lk/congress-warns-modi-india-faces-sri-lanka-like-situation/
• Economic crisis in Sri Lanka: Lessons from 1991 India
– ft.lk/columns/Economic-crisis-in-Sri-Lanka-Lessons-from-1991-India/4-733197
• Don’t Burden the Poor with Fuel Price Hikes, Tax the Rich
– newsclick.in/Dont-burden-poor-fuel-price-hikes-tax-rich
• Has China Turned to Capitalism? Reflections on the Transition from Capitalism to Socialism (2017)
– redsails.org/losurdo-on-china/
• The US war against Europe and Germany – Michael Hudson
– defenddemocracy.press/nato-russia-proxy-war-revealing-signs-of-a-fading-america-scott-ritter-michael-hudson/
• The submerging market debt crisis – Roberts
– thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2022/04/03/the-submerging-market-debt-crisis/
• Cuba Prepares for Disaster (White)
– socialistproject.ca/2022/04/cuba-prepares-for-disaster/
• World Bank warns of grim economic outlook for Latin America
– radiohc.cu/en/noticias/internacionales/291104-world-bank-warns-of-grim-economic-outlook-for-latin-america
• Inflation: Reframing the Narrative – Sam Gindin
– socialistproject.ca/2022/04/inflation-reframing-the-narrative/
• The war on inflation – Roberts
– thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2022/03/26/the-war-on-inflation/
• The Return of Global Inflation – Reinhart, von Luckner
– blogs.worldbank.org/voices/return-global-inflation
• Why inflation and the cost-of-living crisis won’t take us back to the 1970s – Tooze
– newstatesman.com/ideas/2022/02/why-inflation-and-the-cost-of-living-crisis-wont-take-us-back-to-the-1970s
• IMF Says Russia Sanctions Threaten to Reduce Dominance of US Dollar
– defenddemocracy.press/imf-says-russia-sanctions-threaten-to-reduce-dominance-of-us-dollar/
• Structural Adjustment Programs
‘Throughout the 1980s and 1990s the U.S. has been a principal force in imposing Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) on most countries of the South’
– fpif.org/structural_adjustment_programs/
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C4. Economy (Usually reported in monetary terms)
ee Economy section shows how media usually measures economy by false indices like GDP, etc., in monetary terms, confusing money and capital, constantly calling for privatization, deregulation, moaning about debt & balance of payments, without stating the need for modern industrial production.
• 39 strategically important state entities jumpstart reforms
‘Several strategically important state institutions such as Inland Revenue Department, Excise Department, Sri Lanka Customs, State Banks, Airport and Aviation Services, Employees Trust Fund, Fisheries Corporation, Tea Board and Coconut Cultivation Board have been listed…also: Foreign Resources Department, National Salaries Commission, Sri Lanka Railways Department, Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau, Sri Lanka Transport Board, Motor Traffic Department and National Water Supply and Drainage etc. Also included are the Postal Department, Overseas Foreign Missions, Labour Department, Sri Lanka Standards Institution, Consumer Affairs Authority and Pensions Department etc.’
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/39-strategically-important-state-entities-jumpstart-reforms-478612.html
• Basil loses finance portfolio to Sabry; bid to finalise all-party cabinet hindered
– island.lk/basil-loses-finance-portfolio-to-sabry-bid-to-finalise-all-party-cabinet-hindered/
• Sabry looks to IMF for cash infusion of $ 3 b in next three years
‘Insists foreign debt moratorium only option’
– ft.lk/front-page/Sabry-looks-to-IMF-for-cash-infusion-of-3-b-in-next-three-years/44-733278
• Imports in January remain at high level of $ 1.96 b despite forex shortage, curbs
‘Expenditure on the importation of intermediate goods increased by 32.5% (y-o-y) in January, driven mainly by fuel, textiles, textile articles (mainly fabrics), base metals (mainly iron and steel), and wheat and plastics and articles thereof (mainly polymers in primary forms).’
– ft.lk/business/Imports-in-January-remain-at-high-level-of-1-96-b-despite-forex-shortage-curbs/34-733034
• Rs. 119 bn printed under Deputy Governor Siriwardana on 6th
– themorning.lk/rs-119-bn-printed-under-deputy-governor-siriwardana-on-6th/
• Sri Lanka’s economy hits rock bottom with money printing spree
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Sri-Lankas-economy-hits-rock-bottom-with-money-printing-spree/2-1137296
• CB sends shockwaves with 700bps policy rate hike to arrest inflation
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/CB-sends-shockwaves-with-700bps-policy-rate-hike-to-arrest-inflation/108-234866
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Central-Bank-further-increases-interest-rates/2-1137304
• India extends a USD 400-million currency swap
‘and has deferred payments owed by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka owed to the Reserve Bank of India under the Asian Clearance Union worth several hundred million dollars’
– themorning.lk/40000-mt-of-rice-to-arrive-under-indian-credit-line-over-weekend/
• T-Bill dealers make a killing while bank depositors earn a pittance
– island.lk/t-bill-dealers-make-a-killing-while-bank-depositors-earn-a-pittance/
• Sri Lanka’s currency plunges to world’s worst-performing in economic meltdown
– bizenglish.adaderana.lk/sri-lankas-currency-plunges-to-worlds-worst-performing-in-economic-meltdown/
• CB likely to announce steep 500-750 bps policy rate hike
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/CB-likely-to-announce-steep-500-750-bps-policy-rate-hike/273-234685
• T-bill yields gallop as uncertainty mounts
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/T-bill-yields-gallop-as-uncertainty-mounts/273-234684
• Six month and one year Treasury bill weighted averages cross 15.00%
– ft.lk/financial-services/Six-month-and-one-year-Treasury-bill-weighted-averages-cross-15-00/42-733124
• Sri Lanka Treasury bill action yields rocket, 3-months up 341bp
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-treasury-bill-action-yields-rocket-3-months-up-341bp-92641/
• Over two-thirds expect rupee/dollar rate to surpass Rs.325 by end April
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Over-two-thirds-expect-rupeedollar-rate-to-surpass-Rs-325-by-end-April/273-234411
• Sri Lanka rupee bid at 315 to the US dollar
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-rupee-bid-at-315-to-the-us-dollar-92712/
• Sri Lanka’s foreign reserves down by US $ 372mn to US $ 1.93bn by end-March
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Sri-Lankas-foreign-reserves-down-by-US-372mn-to-US-1-93bn-by-end-March/273-234865
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-forex-reserves-drop-to-us1-9bn-in-march-2022-92738/
• Sri Lanka rupee trades around 323 against US dollar
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-rupee-trades-around-323-against-us-dollar-92849/
• Surcharge Tax Bill passed with amendments
‘a one-off tax where individuals and companies are taxed 25% on taxable incomes that exceed Rs. 2 billion…. 11 funds including the Employees Provident Fund and the Employees Trust Fund have been exempted from the controversial 25% Surcharge Tax’
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Surcharge-Tax-Bill-passed-with-amendments/2-1137280
• Russia sent $650 million bond payment in rubles after US Treasury blocked dollar transfers
– markets.businessinsider.com/news/bonds/russia-default-debt-bonds-payment-rubles-us-dollars-treasury-sanctions-2022-4
• US carves out mechanism for insulating Russian fertilizer exports from sanctions
– economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/us-carves-out-mechanism-for-insulating-russian-fertilizer-exports-from-sanctions/articleshow/90577961.cms
• Germany withdrew some Russian metals from sanctions
– mk.ru/politics/2022/04/01/istochnik-germaniya-vyvela-nekotorye-rossiyskie-metally-izpod-sankciy.html
_________________________________________________________________________
C5. Workers (Inadequate Stats, Wasteful Transport, Unmodern Plantations, Services)
ee Workers attempts to correct the massive gaps and disinformation about workers, urban and rural and their representatives (trade unions, etc), and to highlight the need for organized worker power
• Prez ignored warnings of shortages in health sector, says CMLS chief
– island.lk/prez-ignored-warnings-of-shortages-in-health-sector-says-cmls-chief/
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-faces-essential-drug-shortage-experts-warn-of-health-crisis-92663/
• Half a dozen protests were held in front of hospitals
– timesonline.lk/news-online/In-pictures-Island-wide-protests-continue/2-1137291
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/08/sri-lanka-hospital-staff-engaged-in-protests-due-to-drug-shortages-inadequate-facilities/
• The Trade Union Co-ordinating Centre to hold protests
– themorning.lk/trade-unions-to-protest-today/
• Dental professionals protest against Govt.
– ft.lk/news/Dental-professionals-protest-against-Govt/56-733091
• Federation of University Teachers’ Associations (FUTA) Press Release
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/federation-of-university-teachers-associations-futa-press-release%ef%bf%bc/
• Public sector workers on token strike today
– adaderana.lk/news/81700/public-sector-workers-on-token-strike-today
• Banking operations disrupted by power cuts – Ceylon Bank’s Employees Union (CBEU)
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Sri-Lanka-banking-operations-disrupted-by-power-cuts/2-1137223
• US-Occupied Korea to open more job opportunities: Korean Minister
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Korea-to-open-more-job-opportunities-Korean-Minister/108-234628
• US-Korea to double employment quota for migrant workers; hike development support
‘22,000 migrant Sri Lankans are employed in Korea under the Employment Permit System (EPS)’
– ft.lk/business/Korea-to-double-employment-quota-for-Lankan-migrant-workers-hike-development-support/34-733094
• Japan supports returnee migrants in collaboration with IOM, ILO
‘Japan assisted ‘Nipuna Saviya’ – Sewing and Training Centre located in Beruwala Divisional Secretariat, Kalutara District was declared open…In addition to this centre, other 21 skill trainings centres will be built in nine districts of Sri Lanka.’
– ft.lk/news/Japan-supports-returnee-migrants-in-collaboration-with-IOM-ILO/56-733268
• SL expatriates in West protest, threaten to stop sending remittances
‘Several protests in Auckland, New Zealand, Perth, Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, in Australia’
– island.lk/sl-expatriates-protest-threaten-to-stop-sending-remittances/
• Dr Gamini Goonetilleke: Experiences of being a surgeon in a war zone
– dailymirror.lk/news-features/Dr-Gamini-Goonetilleke-Experiences-of-being-a-surgeon-in-a-war-zone/131-234585
• English chocolate giant Mondelez Cadbury accused of child labor abuse
– radiohc.cu/en/noticias/internacionales/291096-british-chocolate-giant-accused-of-child-labor-abuse
• Social Housing for All – Is housing a human right? Or is it a privilege
– socialistproject.ca/2022/04/social-housing-for-all/
• Social Commons and the Housing Crisis
‘It’s not simply a matter of insufficient supply, but rather a deficit of affordable housing for renters and purchasers’
– socialistproject.ca/2022/04/social-commons-and-the-housing-crisis/
_________________________________________________________________________
C6. Agriculture (Robbery of rural home market; Machines, if used, mainly imported)
ee Agriculture emphasizes the failure to industrialize an agriculture that keeps the cultivator impoverished under moneylender and merchant, and the need to develop the rural home market, monetization and commercialization, to produce, rather than import, agricultural machinery.
• Sun is directly over Sri Lanka for ten days
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Sun-is-directly-over-Sri-Lanka-for-ten-days/108-234576
• High priority for development of Kelani Valley urged at Philip Gunawardena commemoration
‘authorities since the Dutch and English colonial rulers have failed to pay sufficient attention to the problems of floods and the development potential of the Kelani River valle’
– island.lk/high-priority-for-development-of-kelani-valley-urged-at-the-philip-gunawardena-commemoration/
• Speaker warns of food crisis, urges all MPs to unite to overcome it
– island.lk/speaker-warns-of-food-crisis-urges-all-mps-to-unite-to-overcome-it/
– island.lk/speaker-pleads-with-members-to-end-petty-bickering-and-get-down-to-serious-business-of-rescuing-country-from-current-mess/
• First consignment of rice under Indian credit line to arrive this weekend
– timesonline.lk/news-online/First-consignment-of-rice-under-Indian-credit-line-to-arrive-this-weekend/2-1137290
– themorning.lk/40000-mt-of-rice-to-arrive-under-indian-credit-line-over-weekend/
– adaderana.lk/news/81692/first-consignment-of-rice-from-india-expected-to-arrive-in-weekend
• Tea traders warn severe impact from shortage of fuel, power –Tea Traders’ Association
‘CTTA established in 1894 is the apex private sector body comprising of all Stakeholders namely Growers, Manufacturers, Brokers and Buyers/Exporters’
– bizenglish.adaderana.lk/tea-industry-in-a-state-of-disturbance/
– ft.lk/front-page/Tea-traders-warn-severe-impact-from-shortage-of-fuel-power/44-733151
– island.lk/power-and-fuel-crises-expected-to-severely-hit-sls-tea-industry/
• Colombo tea auctions buoyant, quantities dip
– timesonline.lk/business/Colombo-tea-auctions-buoyant-quantities-dip/10-1137277
• Sri Lanka loses apparel and tea orders to India
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Sri-Lanka-loses-apparel-and-tea-orders-to-India/108-234862
• Japan grants 500 mln yen for Sri Lanka’s phytosanitary certification
‘to expedite the ability to export perishable plant commodities’
– economynext.com/japan-grants-500-mln-yen-for-sri-lankas-phytosanitary-certification-92617/
• Ukraine scrambling to export grain as Russia’s war blocks Black Sea ports: analyst
– globalnews.ca/news/8730547/ukraine-export-grain-russia-war/
_____________________________________________________________________
C7. Industry (False definitions, anti-industrial sermons, rentier/entrepreneur, etc)
ee Industry notes the ignorance about industrialization (versus handicraft and manufacture), the dependence on importing foreign machinery, the need to make machines that make machines, build a producer culture. False definitions of industry, entrepreneur, etc, abound, and the need for a holistic political, economic and military strategy to overcome domination by merchants and moneylenders.
• Pharmaceutical importers demand revision of Maximum Retail Price (MRP) of 60 medicines
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/news/govt-seeks-help-from-wb-adb-and-un-479095.html
• Acute shortage of essential medicines, reagents, equipment and consumables
– island.lk/medical-community-urges-president-to-address-immediate-needs/
• Can credit lines resolve present drug shortage?
‘Health unionists claim that imported drugs will be limited to generic drugs’
– dailymirror.lk/news-features/Can-credit-lines-resolve-present-drug-shortage/131-234234
• Acute shortage of medicines threatening; SLMA writes to President
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Acute-shortage-of-medicines-threatening-SLMA-writes-to-President/108-234749
• Personal gain behind claims of drug shortage, alleges Pharmaceuticals State Minister
– themorning.lk/personal-gain-behind-claims-of-drug-shortage-alleges-pharmaceuticals-state-minister/
• WHO to provide USD 2 Mn for medicine
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/06/who-to-provide-usd-2-mn-for-medicine/
• Power cuts could cripple SL Internet
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/power-cuts-could-cripple-sl-internet-478610.html
• India to build Sri Lanka wind farms after China pushed aside
– ft.lk/news/India-to-build-Sri-Lanka-wind-farms-after-China-pushed-aside/56-732871
• Indian Oil Corp (IOC) excels at National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka Awards
– ft.lk/business/Lanka-IOC-excels-at-NCCSL-awards/34-732870
• India eases pressure on SLPP govt. by delivering 40,000MT of diesel
– island.lk/india-eases-pressure-on-slpp-govt-by-delivering-40000mt-of-diesel/
• Sri Lanka power regulator seeks diesel from India envoy
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-power-regulator-seeks-diesel-from-india-envoy-92666/
• Documents leaked to Daily Mirror reveal what went wrong in Sri Lankan power sector
– dailymirror.lk/eye/Documents-leaked-to-Daily-Mirror-reveal-what-went-wrong-in-Sri-Lankan-power-sector/372-234687
• Sri Lanka gets diesel ship from Indian credit line
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-gets-diesel-ship-from-indian-credit-line-92411/
• India supplies 76,000 tonnes of fuel
– timesonline.lk/news-online/India-supplies-76-000-tonnes-of-fuel/2-1137276
• $52 mn paid to Singaporean company for diesel
– themorning.lk/52-mn-paid-to-singaporean-company-for-diesel/
• US$500 million Indian Credit line for fuel to be exhausted by April end
– dailymirror.lk/latest_news/US-500-million-Indian-Credit-line-for-fuel-to-be-exhausted-by-April-end/342-234755
• Sri Lanka has used 60-pct of USD 500 mln Indian fuel credit line – sources
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-has-used-60-pct-of-usd-500-mln-indian-fuel-credit-line-sources-92802/
• CEB saddled with USD 30,000 a day demurrage payments to ship that brought coal last Friday
– island.lk/ceb-saddled-with-usd-30000-a-day-demurrage-payments-to-ship-that-brought-coal-last-friday/
• Sri Lanka buys coal from Russia’s SUEK at a discount
– reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/exclusive-sri-lanka-buys-coal-russias-suek-discount-sources-say-2022-03-30/
• Unionist asks why long queues at filling stations when CPC has large fuel stocks
– island.lk/unionist-asks-why-long-queues-at-filling-stations-when-cpc-has-large-fuel-stocks/
• Unavailability of storage capacities key reason for fuel crisis: CPC Chief
– ft.lk/front-page/Unavailability-of-storage-capacities-key-reason-for-fuel-crisis-CPC-Chief/44-733276
• Norwegian Embassy brings together experts to discuss opportunities for rising energy demand
‘University of Jaffna Prof. Arulampalam Atputharajah, Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) Director General Damitha Kumarasinghe, International Finance Cooperation Investment Officer Saule Imanova, Sri Lanka Sustainable Energy Authority Chairman Ranjith Sepala, Moderator Namiz Musafer, Specialist in sustainability and clean energy Dr. Vidhura Ralapanawa and Lanka Electricity Company (LECO) General Manager Dr. Narendra De Silva: appropriate policy environment, to develop innovative financial models and to develop new practices to attract more investment into the sector, specially from the private sector’
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/SL-must-focus-on-3-key-areas-if-serious-about-achieving-renewable-energy-targets/273-234601
– ft.lk/business/Norwegian-Embassy-brings-together-experts-to-discuss-opportunities-to-meet-the-rising-energy-demand-in-SL/34-733033
• Minister Jayasekara not industrious on industry contribution to GDP
– dailymirror.lk/slide-1/Minister-Jayasekara-not-industrious-on-industry-contribution-to-GDP/329-234140
• Old sunken boats – Somasiri Devendra
‘Did the people of Sri Lanka venture out to sea and, if so, in what type of ship? It was this question that drove me to the study of boats, ships and maritime history’
– island.lk/old-sunken-boats/
• IMF: How soaring shipping costs raise prices around the world
‘The sea carries more than 80 per cent of the world’s traded goods, most of which sail inside 40-foot-long steel containers’
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/imf-how-soaring-shipping-costs-raise-prices-around-the-world-478580.html
• Electrical equipment experts focus on saving power through tech advancements
‘M.Karunanithy – Senior manager power utilities, Brundha Priyadharshini – Senior manager (T & MI), Upul Kulatunga – Director business development, M.Maniymuthu – Proprietor Marlbo, Manish Mahajan – Head IG – USA’s Fluke Technology India, S.Ramannan – Engineer (T & MI)’
– island.lk/electrical-equipment-experts-focus-on-saving-power-through-tech-advancements/
• Free Trade Zone Manufacturers write to President’s Secy.
– ft.lk/front-page/Free-Trade-Zone-Manufacturers-write-to-President-s-Secy/44-733042
• Joint Apparel Association demands immediate solutions, end to Government procrastination
– timesonline.lk/business/JAAF-demands-immediate-solutions-end-to-Governments-procrastination/10-1137271
• Sri Lanka loses apparel and tea orders to India
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Sri-Lanka-loses-apparel-and-tea-orders-to-India/108-234862
• Perilous state of printing industry
– ft.lk/columns/Perilous-state-of-printing-industry/4-733056
• USAID & NDB strategies with Jaffna SMEs
– ft.lk/business/USAID-supports-Sri-Lanka-100-shares-customer-awareness-and-retention-strategies-with-Jaffna-SMEs/34-733032
• Researchers Build AI That Builds AI
‘By using hypernetworks, researchers can now preemptively fine-tune artificial neural networks, saving some of the time and expense of training’
– quantamagazine.org/researchers-build-ai-that-builds-ai-20220125/
• Use of novel ionic liquids to process wood biomass into high-performance textile fibres
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/sustainable-concept-for-wood-based-textile-fibres/
• Massive investments in Guyana’s oil and gas industry by Exxon-Mobil
– en.mercopress.com/2022/04/06/massive-investments-in-guyana-s-oil-and-gas-industry-by-exxon-mobil
• Canada approves offshore oil plan
– globaltimes.cn/page/202204/1258722.shtml
______________________________________________________________________
C8. Finance (Making money from money, banks, lack of investment in modernity)
ee Finance tracks the effects of financialization, the curious role of ratings agencies, false indices, etc., and the rule of moneylenders, preventing investment in modern production.
• Finance company deposit ceiling rate further raised as interest rates surge
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Finance-company-deposit-ceiling-rate-further-raised-as-interest-rates-surge/273-234409
• What the US Dollar crisis means for Sri Lanka’s importers and exporters
– bizenglish.adaderana.lk/what-the-us-dollar-crisis-means-for-sri-lankas-importers-and-exporters/
• CSE recovers somewhat amid persisting political uncertainties and tensions
– island.lk/cse-recovers-somewhat-amid-persisting-political-uncertainties-and-tensions/
• CSE fails to maintain positive momentum
– island.lk/cse-fails-to-maintain-positive-momentum/
• CSE investors switching to govt. securities in view of current uncertainties
– island.lk/cse-investors-switching-to-govt-securities-in-view-of-current-uncertainties/
• Sri Lanka shares fall to 8-month low on rising rates, political crisis
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-shares-fall-to-8-month-low-on-rising-rates-political-crisis-92789/
– island.lk/cse-plunges-to-eight-month-low-as-rising-market-interest-rates-take-their-toll/
• Sri Lanka stocks fall on economic, political woes; banks lead
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-stocks-fall-on-economic-political-woes-banks-lead-92851/
• Stock market closed whole of next week
– ft.lk/front-page/Stock-market-closed-whole-of-next-week/44-733277
• US Fed Chair Misled Congress on Megabanks and their Need for Emergency Loans
– wallstreetonparade.com/2022/04/new-data-shows-fed-chair-powell-misled-congress-on-the-condition-of-the-megabanks-and-their-need-for-emergency-loans/
• US Fed Responded to March 2020 Dow Crash with $1Trillion in Repo Loans to 24 Trading Houses
– wallstreetonparade.com/2022/04/in-a-six-day-span-in-march-2020-the-dow-crashed-5676-points-the-fed-responded-with-almost-1-trillion-in-repo-loans-to-24-trading-houses/
• Is New York Fed’s Trading Floor Near Futures Exchange in Chicago Behind Erratic Gyrations in Stock Market?
– wallstreetonparade.com/2022/04/is-the-new-york-feds-trading-floor-near-the-futures-exchange-in-chicago-behind-the-erratic-gyrations-in-the-stock-market/
• Fed’s Secrecy Has Killed the Price Discovery Function of the Stock Market
– wallstreetonparade.com/2022/04/these-charts-show-how-the-feds-secrecy-has-killed-the-price-discovery-function-of-the-stock-market/
___________________________________________________________________________________
C9. Business (Rentierism: money via imports, real-estate, tourism, insurance, fear, privatization)
ee Business focuses on the rentier diversions of the oligarchy, the domination by a merchant mafia, making money from unproductive land sales, tourism, insurance, advertising, etc. – the charade of corporate press releases disguised as ‘news’
• Ceylon Chamber fears govt.’s actions could damage country’s reputation
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Ceylon-Chamber-fears-govt-s-actions-could-damage-countrys-reputation/273-234408
• Union Assurance net income exceeds Rs. 20 bn
– themorning.lk/union-assurance-net-income-exceeds-rs-20-bn/
• Sri Lanka Retailers’ Association urges cuts in lease rentals
‘Retail accounts for over one-third of the GDP and over 15 per cent of the employment in Sri Lanka’
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/sri-lanka-retailers-association-urges-cuts-in-lease-rentals-478582.html
• Keells Food CEO Viranga Indunil Wickramaratne
‘previously the Chief Operating Officer, Retail, at Diesel and Motor Engineering PLC (DIMO), and prior to that the General Manager, Sales and Marketing, Brandix Lingerie’
– ft.lk/business/JKH-looks-externally-to-fill-Keells-Food-CEO-post/34-733191
• Tourism stakeholders join countrywide protests
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Tourism-sector-sickened-by-governments-apathy-towards-industry-revival/273-234410
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/Tourism-stakeholders-join-countrywide-protests/273-234613
• Sri Lanka axes Norway, Iraq embassies, Sydney consulate over currency crisis
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-axes-norway-iraq-embassies-sydney-consulate-over-currency-crisis-92603/
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Lankas-Embassies-in-Oslo-and-Baghdad-and-Consulate-General-in-Sydney-temporarily-closed/2-1137273
______________________________________________________
C10. Politics (Anti-parliament discourse, unelected constitution)
ee Politics points to the constant diversions and spectacles and the mercantile and financial forces funding the political actors, of policy hijacked by private interests minus public oversight.
• For Some Every Day is April 1st – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_2.html
• Are there any solutions for those who want to remove Gotabhaya and become President?
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post.html
• SLFP ready to quit, questions why Sabry is Finance
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/SLFP-ready-to-quit-questions-why-Sabry-is-Finance/108-234457
• Ali Sabry’s Long-Term Solutions – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_4.html
• An invitation to change Parliament, not to change the system – Nalin de Silva
– kalaya.org/2022/04/blog-post_5.html
• Sarvodaya – Executive presidency, and party-political system should be abolished
– ft.lk/opinion/Dr-A-T-Ariyaratne-speaks-out-on-the-crises-suggests-way-forward/14-733140
• Curb Corruption: Action against Secretaries/Public Officials & Advisors – Waduge
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/06/curb-corruption-in-sri-lanka-action-against-secretaries-public-officials-advisors/
• The betrayal of the young
– island.lk/the-betrayal-of-the-young/
• Kandyans ask govt. to resign
– island.lk/kandyans-ask-govt-to-resign/
• SJB, JVP defy curfew and protest
– island.lk/sjb-jvp-defy-curfew-and-protest/
• Mayhem starts in Mirihana! Where will it go? How will it end?
– island.lk/mayhem-starts-in-mirihana-where-will-it-go-how-will-it-end/
• Entire govt. including PM should resign: Wimal
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Entire-govt-including-PM-should-resign-Wimal/108-234740
• Entire Cabinet except PM resigns amidst growing public disenchantment
– ft.lk/top-story/Entire-Cabinet-except-PM-resigns-amidst-growing-public-disenchantment/26-732988
• SJB calls on government to resign, says it has lost all confidence local & foreign
– island.lk/sjb-calls-on-government-to-resign-says-it-has-lost-all-confidence-local-foreign/
• Demonstrators don’t want solution based on available options in keeping with Constitution: GL
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Colombo-based-Diplomatic-corps-briefed-on-prevailing-situation-in-Sri-Lanka/2-1137288
• No parliamentary election can be called until mid to late-2023
– sundaytimes.lk/220403/business-times/banking-on-loans-478600.html
• Wimal proposes interim govt during meeting with President & PM
– adaderana.lk/news/81599/wimal-proposes-interim-govt-during-meeting-with-president-pm
• JVP gives blunt no to joining any interim govt.
– island.lk/jvp-gives-blunt-no-to-joining-any-interim-govt/
• Cardinal Ranjith joins mass protests in Sri Lanka
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/06/cardinal-ranjith-joins-mass-protests-in-sri-lanka/
• The Current Political Crisis: The Need for Discernment – Church Of Ceylon
– dailymirror.lk/news-features/Statement-by-the-Church-of-Ceylon-THE-CURRENT-POLITICAL-CRISIS-THE-NEED-FOR-DISCERNMENT/131-234586
• Iftar at Independence Square
‘Many who participated in protests today (08) were also seen breaking fast at the Independence square in solidarity. ‘
– newsfirst.lk/2022/04/08/in-pictures-iftar-at-independence-square/
• Maha Sangha joins protest: Requests Govt. not to destabilise country
– themorning.lk/maha-sangha-joins-protest-requests-govt-not-to-destabilise-country/
• No mastermind, no hidden hand – USAID NPC Perera
– island.lk/learning-from-public-protests-to-face-the-future/
• A courageous ‘extremist’ – Austin Fernando
– island.lk/reminiscing-of-pengiriwatta-hundred-hours-later/
• Reduce executive powers
– island.lk/straitjacket-all-politicians/
• Assuage public anger before facing an election.
– island.lk/first-things-first-3/
• Scrap the 29 Member National List – Violation of People’s Franchise
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/scrap-the-29-member-national-list-violation-of-peoples-franchise/
• Opposition lawmakers in Sri Lanka protest government’s decision to impose state of emergency
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/opposition-lawmakers-in-sri-lanka-protest-governments-decision-to-impose-state-of-emergency/
• 42 MPs leave govt. to be independent in Parliament
– island.lk/42-mps-leave-govt-to-be-independent-in-parliament/
• I only told youth at protest not to give up fight against fraudsters: Anura
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/I-only-told-youth-at-protest-not-to-give-up-fight-against-fraudsters-Anura/108-234666
• Field Marshal wants all riff-raff out of Parliament
– island.lk/field-marshal-wants-all-riff-raff-out-of-parliament/
• Rajapaksas too should be put in jail: MP Welgama
– island.lk/welgama-says-it-was-he-who-first-got-the-ball-rolling-against-gotabaya/
• Church wants Prez to heed public call to step down
– island.lk/church-wants-prez-to-heed-public-call-to-step-down/
• Speaker says Parliament can’t ask Prez to step down
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Speaker-says-Parliament-cant-ask-Prez-to-step-down/108-234624
• President loses parliament majority as protests mount
– dailymirror.lk/business-news/President-loses-parliament-majority-as-protests-mount/273-234604
• Gota’s Govt. hangs onto simple majority in Parliament for now
– ft.lk/top-story/Gota-s-Govt-hangs-onto-simple-majority-in-Parliament-for-now/26-733102
• Sri Lankan expatriates unite to protest against Govt.
‘Protestors from Australia, New Zealand, England, France, US, Finland, Canada, Italy and Germany…’
– ft.lk/front-page/Sri-Lankan-expatriates-unite-to-protest-against-Govt/44-732985
• Sri Lanka opposition leader demands reasons for emergency; TNA MP calls for vote
– economynext.com/sri-lanka-opposition-leader-demands-reasons-for-emergency-tna-mp-calls-for-vote-92647/
• JVP to become the next sole alternative exacerbated divisions among Opposition parties
– ft.lk/columns/The-mass-uprising-What-could-be-the-outcome/4-733195
• The Mirihana moment and movement – Jayatilleka
– island.lk/the-mirihana-moment-and-movement/
• Roundtables As Political Change-Agents – Jayatilleka
– island.lk/roundtables-as-political-change-agents/
• The interim trap and a shadow junta-in-waiting – Jayatilleka
– ft.lk/columns/The-interim-trap-and-a-shadow-junta-in-waiting/4-733006
• A negotiated political solution to break the deadlock – Jayatilleka
‘abolishing the Executive Presidency as the Leader of the Opposition suggested, because that would not secure the support of the SLFP and the all-important 40 dissidents’
– ft.lk/columns/A-negotiated-political-solution-to-break-the-deadlock/4-733181
• My personal recommendation for Finance Minister would be Verite’s de Mel – Jayatilleka
– island.lk/solving-the-crisis-step-1
• US mission in Colombo always knew Rajapakasas were disgustingly corrupt – Amarakeerthi
– island.lk/open-letter-to-us/
• Protesters blot their copybook
– island.lk/protesters-blot-their-copybook/
• Villagers storm local Bope-Poddala Pradeshiya Sabha council meeting
– timesonline.lk/news-online/In-pictures-villagers-storm-local-council-meeting/2-1137284
• Rajapaksa’s Losing Grip on Power; Finance Minister Quits Within 24 hrs (India)
– newsclick.in/lanka-crisis-rajapaksa-losing-grip-power-finance-minister-quits-within-24-appointment
• SLPP no alternative but to hand over its reins to the President and help him try to be a success
– island.lk/dysfunctional-govt/
• Sri Lanka: The Price of Authoritarian Rule (India)
– newsclick.in/sri-lanka-price-authoritarian-rule
• Ready to join interim Govt on condition: SJB tells Govt
– timesonline.lk/news-online/Ready-to-join-interim-Govt-on-condition-to-take-up-responsibility-of-rebuilding-economy-SJB-tells-Govt/2-1137292
• SJB to move no-confidence motion against govt.
– dailymirror.lk/top_story/SJB-to-move-no-confidence-motion-against-govt/155-234813
– ft.lk/front-page/SJB-wants-President-to-apologise-to-people/44-733173
• NPP ready to support impeachment, NCM: Vijitha
– dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/NPP-ready-to-support-impeachment-NCM-Vijitha/108-234827
• The provincial council structure introduced a whole new type of politician
‘The trend of large cabinets of useless people crept in. We now have a 225-member Parliament’
– island.lk/susil-in-politics-some-inside-stories/
• Proposals for re-establishment of democracy and social order
– island.lk/proposals-for-re-establishment-of-democracy-and-social-order/
• NM: The Lovable Marxist
– island.lk/nm-the-lovable-marxist/
• Birth of a new world order – David
– island.lk/birth-of-a-new-world-order/
• “Events like this happen once a century”: Sergey Glazyev on the breakdown of epochs and changing ways of life
– thesaker.is/events-like-this-happen-once-a-century-sergey-glazyev-on-the-breakdown-of-epochs-and-changing-ways-of-life/
• US Black Political Distraction
‘a new Black SCOTUS justice or bringing Barack Obama out of retirement for a photo opportunity won’t raise Joe Biden’s poll numbers or stave off defeat in the mid-term elections’
– blackagendareport.com/black-political-distraction
– blackagendareport.com/joe-biden-cant-slap-his-way-out-his-legitimacy-crisis
• Eleanor Marx: The Last Word
– r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp
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C11. Media (Mis/Coverage of economics, technology, science and art)
ee Media shows how corporate media monopoly determines what is news, art, culture, etc. The media is part of the public relations (corporate propaganda) industry. The failure to highlight our priorities, the need to read between the lines. To set new perspectives and priorities.
• The Week: Sri Lanka crisis: Man kills himself in front of President Rajapaksa’s house (Fake)
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/sri-lanka-crisis-man-kills-himself-in-front-of-president-rajapaksas-house/
• The Week: Kin of Lankan minister Namal Rajapaksa leave country: Report
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/kin-of-lankan-minister-namal-rajapaksa-leave-country-report/
• TRT: Sri Lanka protesters gather despite curfew and social media shutdown
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/sri-lanka-protesters-gather-despite-curfew-and-social-media-shutdown/
• In Fake Whatsapp Forward, Sri Lanka’s Left Radical JVP Claims Indian Army Arrived in Colombo, Govt Denies
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/03/in-fake-whatsapp-forward-sri-lankas-left-radical-jvp-claims-indian-army-arrived-in-colombo-govt-denies/
• Sri Lanka’s ruling party operatives in twitter clash over social media ban
– economynext.com/sri-lankas-ruling-party-operatives-in-twitter-clash-over-social-media-ban-92468/
• President’s website hacked by Anonymous India?
– themorning.lk/presidents-website-hacked-by-anonymous-india/
• Protestors in Wikipidia edit war on pages of leaders, ex-CB chief to express displeasure
– economynext.com/sri-lankan-protestors-in-wikipidia-edit-war-on-pages-of-leaders-ex-cb-chief-to-express-displeasure-92556/
• Media, corporates, chambers and professional associations glorify corrupt politicians
– ft.lk/columns/Where-do-politicians-get-their-power-from/4-732981
• Solving the mystery of Kandyan artefacts
– ft.lk/front-page/Solving-the-mystery-of-Kandyan-artefacts/44-733199
• Some reflections on the temples of the South
– island.lk/some-reflections-on-the-temples-of-the-south/
• Lester James Peries and the Gold Winning “Gamperaliya” – Jeyaraj
– dailymirror.lk/opinion/Lester-James-Peries-and-the-Gold-Winning-Gamperaliya/172-234325
• 4 different Ukrainian propaganda clips with different actors all filmed at exact same location
– moonofalabama.org/
• If The Pentagon Cannot Confirm The Bucha Tales, Who Can?
– moonofalabama.org/2022/04/if-the-pentagon-can-not-confirm-the-bucha-tales-who-can
• We Seriously Underestimated Russia; Our Own Propaganda is Killing Us
– readingjunkie.com/2022/04/02/we-seriously-underestimated-russia-our-own-propaganda-is-killing-us/
• MSM’s Bucha Tall Tale
– lankaweb.com/news/items/2022/04/07/msms-bucha-tall-tale/
• How Corporate Media Has Put Americans in State of Ukraine-Russia Psychosis
– newsclick.in/how-corporate-media-has-put-americans-state-ukraine-russia-psychosis
• The “Nationalist” Philosophy of Filmmaker Anand Patwardhan
– newsclick.in/EXCLUSIVE-The-Nationalist-Philosophy-Filmmaker-Anand-Patwardhan
• Laboring Beyond US Black Representation
‘A Black man organizes an unprecedented union victory but gets less attention than one celebrity slapping another. Yet it is the union organizer who will have a real impact on the lives of Black people’
– blackagendareport.com/laboring-beyond-black-representation
• “Claudia Jones: Beyond Containment”
– blackagendareport.com/bar-book-forum-carole-boyce-davies-claudia-jones-beyond-containment
• Only crime not documented on Hunter Biden’s laptop is murder
– kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/jettison-the-animals/
• Women Dominate 2022 International Booker Shortlist
– newsclick.in/women-dominate-2022-international-booker-shortlist
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email: econenews@gmail.com
blog: eesrilanka.wordpress.com
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