Food insecurity, debt rise in Sri Lanka’s north

Many families struggle to put food on the tableAdd caption;Photo: Contributor/IRIN

 COLOMBO, 23 September 2013 (IRIN) - In two northern districts of Sri Lanka, now slowly recovering from decades of conflict, almost seven out of 10 households are “food insecure”, according to a recent survey.

Where is the national education policy every govt. since 1990 promised?

Eric J. de Silva (Former Secretary, Ministry of Education)

Every government that we have had since the Youth Commission of 1990 has acknowledged the need for us to have a National Education Policy which does not change with every change of government or administration. Despite setting up the machinery for the purpose under the National Education Commission Act of 1991, we were not able to prepare a comprehensive policy document that could form the basis for such a policy even until the end of 1996. In sheer desperation, President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga appointed a Task Force in December 1996 under the chairmanship of the then Education Minister, Richard Pathirana, to prepare a set of proposals which her government could start implementing immediately to be able to meet challenges of the day. This the Task Force delivered within the brief period of three months given to it.

Govt. needs to shift economic policy, says citizen group

* Too much attention on infrastructure development, urbanisation, tourism
* Much more can be done for rural economy, poor

A network of citizen groups has sent in its proposals for the 2013 budget to the President, asking the government to give more weight to developing a macroeconomic and political strategy which would uplift the rural economy, marginalised communities and urban poor, instead of pursuing a course favouring infrastructure development, urbanisation, tourism and financialisation.

Organised in to the Active Citizenship for Development Network (ACDN) their recommendations cover four sectors of particular concern to their larger communities; agriculture, fisheries, estates, and state education.

FUTA march generates hate attacks: Minister should apologise

Vickramabahu Karunaratne

The FUTA protest march was a success. Its success could be measured from the hate generated in the government camp. Minister SB said, “We do not intend to look at FUTA as our foe. But for example, take the foreign countries that were visited lately by Nirmal Ranjith Dewasiri. He is a second grade junior lecturer on History. In the recent past he toured Oslo and the US. Who provided the air tickets for his sojourns overseas?

SL tops SAARC region in Human Development

An UNDP Human Development report said yesterday the country secured first place in terms of Human Development among SAARC countries.

According to the report, SAARC countries, other than India and the Maldives, have not even reached Sri Lanka’s HDI for 1980 which was 0.539.

The report said Sri Lanka has vast potential to further improve the situation compared to Singapore and Malaysia.

Terrible fiscal numbers show only hardship to grow; less money for education more for urban development

Construction on the newly repaired A9 road by JAMES MORGAN

Dr. Harsha De Silva
The very recent fiscal and government borrowing numbers released by the Central Bank fail to inspire confidence in the economy and concerns are mounting that taxes could be raised while key public investments too could be cut as was the case in the past resulting in more hardship for the people.

With the budget deficit showing signs of veering off target, Opposition MP and Economic spokesman for the UNP Dr. Harsha De Silva yesterday reiterated that the government would have to increase taxes, duties and utility rates while sacrificing much needed public investments in critical areas of the economy such as education.

How the Envisaged GDP 6% Allocation for Education Could be Utilized Concretely

Jayadeva Uyangoda
The demand made by the FUTA for increased allocation of annual government expenditure on education has now emerged as a national policy slogan, with many sectors of society adopting it as their own demand. This is a key achievement made by the FUTA in its three-month long struggle'

Wages in the Central Bank and universities - Academics deserve a fair deal

''We have learnt from Professor Amal Kumarage of Moratuwa that from October 2012, a Senior Professor, the highest level of employment as an academic in a university, will be paid about Rs.150,000 per month. A senior professor has one or more higher degrees, often including a Ph.D. degree, which is not true for staff in the Central Bank. That difference in wages does not seem fair and certainly seem wrong incentive-wise. An assistant lecturer in a university, often with no more than a good first degree, will receive, Professor Kumarage assured us, close to Rs. 50,000 a month, a far cry from what a new recruit to the Central Bank must be receiving.''

Usvatte-aratchi

SRI LANKA: Too many jobless youth in former war zone

A young man looks to the camera in Jaffna, .

Finding paid work - especially for youths - is still difficult in Sri Lanka’s former conflict zone in the north even after three years of peace and massive infrastructure projects, experts say, pointing to the region’s anaemic private sector as a main cause.

Although official employment data for the region is unavailable, experts in the area estimate that up to 30 percent of the north’s population is unemployed, as opposed to a national rate of 4 percent. Based on the most recent census in 2001, 28 percent of the country’s population is between the ages of 10-24, and there are some 280,000 youths in the former war zone, according to a 2012 government estimate.

FUTA and the survival of democratic dissent; The suffocating grasp of an emergent dictatorship

Kumar David
"Where they burn books, they will afterwards burn people" - Heinrich Heine (German Poet 1821)
The madness fanned by Goebbels and fired by Nazi student organisations, reached a frenzied climax on the night of 10 May 1933 when the nation’s great libraries were stripped of radical, socialist, pacifist, culturally alien and Jewish books, and piled on bonfires, lit as Germany careened to censorship, culture control and eventually the most naked of all Twentieth Century dictatorships. No nation that permits the state to crush its knowledge workers can long survive. The FUTA strike is no longer about academic salaries, long ago it morphed beyond that, it is no longer about securing a fair deal in education for the nation’s children, that Rubicon has also been crossed.

FUTA strike:Key questions about education, trade unionism, policy development and the future of students

 Andi Schubert

The trade union action of the Federation of University Teachers’ Associations (FUTA) is now about to enter its fourth month. Prior to and during the strike a number of debates and discussion have raged between supporters, opponents and observers about the issues raised by FUTA viz. education and the crisis facing the education sector in Sri Lanka. In this short article I hope to examine the nature of the debate so far and hope to broaden it by introducing the dimension of social emancipation. This article is the further development of a point I raised during the "Forum with Eran" program organized by Eran Wickramaratne MP on the 26th of September which brought together Dr. Nirmal Ranjith Dewasiri and Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha MP for a discussion on the education crisis in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka suicide rate one of the world’s highest

Niroshini Amarsinghe and her three children
with photo of Milton Rupes Nonis
 

Sujeewa Amaranath
New official data shows that Sri Lanka still has one of highest suicide rates in the world, with almost 4,000 people killing themselves per year, or about 11 per day. Dr. Neil Fernando, who heads the country’s National Institute of Mental Health Promotion, released the figures in a Suicide Prevention Day seminar on September 10. The majority of victims, he reported, were aged 15 to 44.

The academics are marching. The students are marching. The Muslims are marching.

Dharisha Bastians
The academics are marching. The students are marching. The Muslims are marching.

Every day hundreds images of throngs of people shouting slogans and demonstrating blare across television screens, newspapers and of course, the internet.

SMS news alerts about road closures and barricades abound as popular discontent rises to the surface through trade union agitation and ethno-religious outrage. In fact, with the opposition largely impotent, public discontent is being channelled into people’s movements that are taking arms against unpopular Government policy and rampant corruption.

The government, the LLRC and what civil society can do

Mahinda Rajapaksa at a Hindu religious ceremony. (File photo)

Dr. Jehan Perera

“The entire section of the LLRC Report that deals with the issue of missing and disappeared persons and the trauma it has wreaked on the lives of possibly tens of thousands of families has been entirely ignored by the LLRC Action Plan. As many as nine LLRC recommendations that are in paragraphs 9.43 to 9.60 are missing from the LLRC Action Plan.”
An entrenched government
The government has overcome several formidable challenges to itself in the past few weeks. It
has now secured control over the Eastern Provincial Council even though it failed to win the majority of seats in it.

Large crowds for university teachers’ ‘March’

It is reported that the protest march launched by university teachers commenced from Galle today (24th) morning and reached Ambalangoda in the evening.

It is time for the Long March for Free Education.

futa
It is time for the Long March for Free Education.

The long march currently being organized follows a series of  ground-breaking mega events organized by FUTA to socialize the concept  of the need to increase allocations for education (6%!) and  de-politicizing of the education secotor.

India wants Sri Lanka to accept TNA as interlocutor

Rajapaksha and Singh: who tells what ( File photo)

With Sri Lanka’s human rights record coming up for review towards the end of the year, India believes that Colombo should accept the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) as a credible interlocutor and get down to discussing a road map for political devolution of powers as this will send a positive signal world-wide to groups instrumental in arraigning it before the United Nations Human Rights Council in March this year.
During talks with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Thursday — the first in over two years — it is understood that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh reiterated that the sooner the Sri Lankan government finalises a road map with the TNA, the better it would be for all sides. India concedes that Colombo has engaged in serious dialogue with the TNA but feels that the time has come to convert it into a programme of action.

Condemn the arrest of IUSF convener – JVP

Sanjeewa Bandara

The Political Bureau of the JVP has issued a statement condemning the arrest of the convener of the Inter University Students Federation (IUSF).

The statement issued yesterday (20th) states, “Yesterday (18th), the convener of Inter University Students Federation the student Sanjeewa Bandara was arrested by the police. He was arrested while going back after participating in an agitation organized by the IUSF demanding the government to solve issues in the education sector including that of university teachers.

Nightmares of Sri Lankan journalists in asylum in Europe

File photo by UNHRC

Frances Harrison
The war may be over in Sri Lanka, but it is still not safe for journalists there
I recently received a heartbreaking email saying a Sri Lankan journalist, his wife and nine year old child had spent the night with all their suitcases on a bench in a park in Paris. He’d been thrown out of the house where he was been staying, after losing his part time job washing dishes in a restaurant. It was difficult to organise emergency help because media organisations were shut over the weekend and his mobile phone was often switched off to preserve the credit.

FUTA Strike and the Conspiracy Stories

Prof. Uyangoda:allegations are malicious, absurd and totally untrue

Jayadeva Uyangoda, Member, Arts Faculty Teachers’ Association (AFTA), University of Colombo

 Some politicians and media officials linked to the government have begun to describe the FUTA strike as  an attempt to overthrow the present government. Some have even come out with the fantastic idea that the F UTA is planning a ‘Suharto style’ conspiracy.  I understand that my name has been linked to this imagined conspiracy, either as a co-conspirator, or even as the leading conspirator.  I don’t think I deserve such an honour.

Although I am amused by these conspiracy stories, which are nothing but political mud-slinging against the FUTA, I am also concerned about them, because they are propagated in some sections of the government media, with sinister objectives.