{"id":102037,"date":"2020-05-07T16:31:20","date_gmt":"2020-05-07T23:31:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=102037"},"modified":"2020-05-07T16:32:37","modified_gmt":"2020-05-07T23:32:37","slug":"deconfinement-in-france-to-brave-the-future-despite-covid-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/05\/07\/deconfinement-in-france-to-brave-the-future-despite-covid-19\/","title":{"rendered":"Deconfinement in France to brave the future despite Covid 19"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Charles S.Perera<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The Prime Minister  Edouard Philippe of France announced\ntoday that the first stage of  de-confinement of the French people who had\nbeen in confinement since 17 March,2020, will begin from 11 May 2020. People\nare allowed to leave their homes and go for a distance of 100km from their\nhomes without having a certificate of leaving home for a specific\npurpose. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

France which had been an unfortunate victim of the Corona pandemic\nwith 137 779 covid-19 affected persons; and 25 987 deaths from the virus has\ndecided to open the country to commence economic activities to revitalise its\neconomy. Some enterprises have commenced work and others may follow.  The\nCommercial Centres are open. Even lakes and beaches may open subject\nrestrictions imposed by the relevant authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those who venture out of homes should wear  masks. The public\ntransport is opened under conditions of keeping the required physical\ndistansing, specifying special hours for  office and other workers.. The\nRestaurants and Bars are to be kept closed. The Schools will still not be\nopened, though some schools and colleges may open by the 18th May. The places\nof worship will remain closed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If one is ill  and suspects having the Corona Virus then he\nshould call  a Doctor. It is only if one has fever and difficulty in\nbreathing that one should telephone No.15. There are no Centres of Confinement\nas in Sri Lanka. One has to restrict oneself to self confinement, (until one\nrecovers or dies). What is in bracket I have added as the Government is not\nspecific. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is only now that the government  seems to be collecting\ninformation with regard to contacts and associates of persons affected by the\nvirus.  For a long time there was a dearth of masks and whatever was\navailable were meant for the medical professionals.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the Government says that every one should wear a mask. Though\nthe Government says that the  elderly and the invalids should be given\nmasks free, they are not available even in Pharmacies. However some\npharmacies  sell hand made masks for about Rs.1500,00 each.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The elderly have to go to do their own shopping or  buy their\nmedicine in pharmacies. There are no ambulant traders going from door to door\nto sell  consumer articles or even bread to the people remaining in\nconfinement. France is unable to imagine such facilities. All those good\nservices happen only in Sri Lanka. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

France has money to look after its people living in fear of\nCovid-19 better than it is doing now.  The Army and the Police have been\nmobilised by the government, but we in some parts of France do not see the Army\nand Police carrying out any special work in these parts of  France. The\nArmy and Police personnel are not as kind, polite and serviable as they are in\nSri Lanka. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is striking here is that the government calls a press\nconference and allows the journalists to pose questions.  The Opposition\npolitical parties do not carry vicious campaigns against the Government\ncriticising the Government  for the way it is managing the Covid-19. \nThe Political parties do not interfere into the activities taken by the\ngovernment in its fight against Covid-19. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a lesson for the politicians of Sri Lanka who instead of\nhelping  with the excellent work the President and his government  is\ndoing to meet the situation in difficult circumstances keep urging the\nGovernment in different forums  in the TV to recall the Parliament that\nhad been Constitutionally dissolved by the President of Sri Lanka. Why recall a\ndissolved parliament, when the President has the necessary laws which had been\npassed before to deal with any situation arising in the cause of \nattending to the pandemic situation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some parliamentarians  not satisfied being left outside the\nlimelight have even filed action in courts to find out whether they could find\na legal means to get the President to recall the dissolved parliament. One\ncannot say what decision the Courts would take  considering an earlier\ncase where a President had dissolved the  parliament rightly under article\n33 of the Constitution,  and the Courts overlooking the Article 33,had\nruled that the President  has no power  to dissolve the Parliament\nuntil the end of four and half years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Article 33 showed a way out of a most undemocratic situation\nof an article introduced by the Government to the Constitution that  \ndeprived  the President from dissolving the Government before the end of\nfour and half years even when  the Prime Minister and the government had\nlost the trust of the people.  There the Courts deprived democracy\u201d to\nfunction for four and a half years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let us hope that the President and the Government in Sri Lanka\nwith the Medical Services and Armed Forces will be able to continue the good\nwork it is doing to fight the Covid -19, until it calls for an  election\nto have a new Parliament.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Charles S.Perera The Prime Minister  Edouard Philippe of France announced today that the first stage of  de-confinement of the French people who had been in confinement since 17 March,2020, will begin from 11 May 2020. People are allowed to leave their homes and go for a distance of 100km from their homes without having […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-102037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-charles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102037"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102037\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}