{"id":146399,"date":"2024-12-07T19:11:16","date_gmt":"2024-12-08T02:11:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=146399"},"modified":"2024-12-07T19:11:16","modified_gmt":"2024-12-08T02:11:16","slug":"us-grabs-for-sri-lankas-graphite-as-cabinet-liquidates-state-construction-corporation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2024\/12\/07\/us-grabs-for-sri-lankas-graphite-as-cabinet-liquidates-state-construction-corporation\/","title":{"rendered":"US Grabs for Sri Lanka\u2019s Graphite as Cabinet Liquidates State Construction\u00a0Corporation"},"content":{"rendered":"

e-Con e-News<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
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blog: eesrilanka.wordpress.com<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Before you study the economics, study the economists!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

e-Con e-News 01-07 December 2024<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s the latest Scam, Uncle IMF Sam?<\/em><\/strong> Why, why, why<\/em> is the USA rushing so many US Democratic-Party-allied functionaries, one after another, into Sri Lanka \u2013 their pivot within their \u2018pivot to Asia\u2019? Can it be the imminent advent of the US Republican-Party\u2019s Trump, who may try grab a percentage of their loot from Sri Lanka?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Just after China\u2019s envoy Qi Zhenzhong suggests that Sri Lanka\u2019s independence is in peril<\/em><\/strong>, the Sunday Times <\/em>concludes this \u2018indicates this country is sailing in rough seas on the external front\u2019. Then in rushes Imran-Coupster Don Banana2 Lu, who must be under pressure, for the photos given to media always show him laughing, laughing and laughing\u2026. Yes, another Donald, a grinning assassin, who seems to have demanded the attention of Sri Lanka\u2019s \u2018highest citizens\u2019, numbers 1, 2 & 3 \u2013 President, Prime Minister & Speaker \u2013 plus the Foreign Minister and Treasury Secretary. Banana Lu is here to reinforce their resident Envoy\u2019s geophysical and fiscal threats. He also provides colored State Department cover for their shady USAID Deputy Assistant Administrator Anjali Kaur <\/strong>& pale US Treasury Department Deputy Assistant Secretary Robert Kaproth<\/strong>, a frequent flyer into Colombo. We should also point out how the Fitch Rating Agency<\/strong> stood erect in glee over the Bank of Ceylon (BOC)<\/strong>\u2019s prospects, right after their envoy lost-Korean Jiyoon (in English doggie-talk, Julie) \u2018Banana1\u2019 Chung was taken on a guided tour of the Bank (perhaps its vaults too). And how coincidental is this: A US Court has set a December 16<\/strong> deadline for US Caribbean tax-hideout Hamilton Reserve Bank\u2019s ISB case against the Sri Lankan Government! So it\u2019s all set for a happy new 2025! Fasten your seatbelts!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Then again, it maybe Sri Lanka\u2019s abundant minerals<\/strong>, which most citizens seem to be unaware of, which excites Fitch most. Has the BoC agreed not to finance the state\u2019s industrial initiatives, as it was once meant to do? Plans this week by China<\/strong> to restrict exports to the USA of their<\/strong> abundant rare earth minerals <\/strong>(gallium, germanium, graphite<\/strong>, etc), vital for technology, both for military & civilian applications, were announced by their Ministry of Commerce. China\u2019s ban came just a day after the US Biden regime announced restrictions on their exports of \u2018cutting-edge chipmaking equipment & materials<\/strong>\u2019 \u2013 essential for artificial intelligence (AI) technology. So much for all those Advocata dicta about \u2018Free Trade\u2019! So, are these visits about confirming Sri Lanka as a favored US satrapy and<\/em> a grab for the paydirt?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Vichara notes in this week\u2019s ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>, how Sri Lanka is abundant, under both land & seas too, with such minerals as graphite, <\/strong>which can be:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018converted into graphene<\/strong> for electronics, medical devices, & energy storage,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

and for manufacturing of lithium-ion battery anodes<\/strong>,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

a critical component in EVs <\/strong>(e-vehicles).Our ilmenite <\/strong>& rutile<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

can be refined into titanium<\/strong> metal for aerospace & medical applications<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& for the production of ceramic-grade zircon<\/strong> for tiles<\/strong> & sanitaryware<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our apatite<\/strong> can be used tomanufacture of phosphoric acid<\/strong> & fertilizers<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It may be no coincidence that the Industries Ministry announced a<\/strong> dossier on industrial lands available for investment<\/strong>, much of it in Mannar<\/strong>. Vichara examines the substance more than the \u2018eloquent\u2019 style of the President\u2019s Policy Statement, focusing on the latest government\u2019s plans for the economy. Vichara also points to the US-funded Yahapalana regime\u2019s sabotaging of the<\/strong> Cooperative Wholesale Establishment (CWE),<\/strong> with more-than-a-helping hand by England\u2019s Unilever<\/strong>. The CWE, established to cater to the cooperative sector, was during Philip Gunawardena\u2019s era time linked to the Multi-purpose Cooperative<\/strong> Scheme<\/strong>. He notes how \u2018the cooperatives served the nation during the 1983 pogroms when private trade hardly functioned\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Who should be \u2018fired\u2019 when the IMF-guided Central Bank<\/strong> gets \u2018inflation so wrong\u2019<\/strong>? asks Ahilan Kadirgamar in his expos\u00e9 of the IMF\u2019s Deflationary Disaster<\/em>.  In this ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>, Kadirgamar points to \u2018the overnight depreciation of the rupee<\/strong> from Rs200 to Rs364 to the USDollar\u2019, based on the IMF\u2019s fake prescriptions<\/strong>, which he figures, will undermine \u2018economic growth, livelihoods & job creation\u2019<\/strong>. The IMF & most Central Banks around the world remain \u2018beholden to the interests of finance capital\u2019. Yet, is it financial capital, or just capital, or more particularly industrial capita? which is what matters most to ee<\/em><\/strong>. The job of these IMF-dependent Central Banks is to prevent industrialization in our countries so as to forestall any competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Colombo Tea Traders\u2019 Association (CTTA) celebrates 130 years\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 \u2018Half the estates are now controlled by 2 big companies<\/strong> \u2013 Hayleys<\/strong> & Richard Pieris<\/strong>, notes National Peoples Power (NPP<\/strong>) Executive Committee member &Peradeniya Professor Vijaya Kumar. He is also President of the Lanka Estate Workers\u2019 Union<\/strong>. In this ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> Kumar notes, wages in the plantations were once based on Wages Board decisions, until this private management took over in 1992. He makes no mention of the failure to invest in technology & related skills, nor that the top English multinational Unilever<\/strong>, the chief beneficiary of the plantation system, should pay compensation by transferring machine-making tea technology to Sri Lanka. Kumar notes how Regional Plantation Companies are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Focused on undermining workers\u2019 rights by converting permanent staff<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

into informal workers <\/strong>offered contract work or independent work through<\/p>\n\n\n\n

a pernicious outgrower<\/strong> system<\/strong>, paying them poverty-level wages<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

& reducing their social protection benefits.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Management has meanwhile made a fine art of hiding profits<\/strong> by transferring them to<\/p>\n\n\n\n

associate companies to justify their claims of running at a loss<\/strong>. But one does not understand<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& it remains unexplained why companies are taking on more & more estates<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

if in fact they are making a loss<\/strong>. Management is able to offer low wages knowing full well<\/p>\n\n\n\n

that any strikes by workers living on the kind of subsistence wages paid to estate workers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

cannot last long & are bound to fail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Plantation workers have traditionally been used as a benchmark to keep wages for all workers low<\/em><\/strong>. Our countries are kept underdeveloped<\/strong> by relegating us to exporting such primary products <\/strong>including products based on labor-intensive production<\/strong> processes such as garments, electronic assembly, etc. A small raise in wages translates into lesser profits, and profits over the last 150 years are never invested in capital equipment & raising skills. These workers should be provided equal rights on the basis of being incorporated into the larger body politic, rather than being used as pawns by India & England and the USA. They should also be offered passage to London as an alternative, as was offered to Indians in England\u2019s African colonies \u2013 some have become ministers & one even a Prime Minister! \u2013 and to \u2018Tamil refugees\u2019 this week, who somehow got to enter and stay in a heavily fortified US base in  English-colonized Diego Garcia!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Again, however, our economists should come right out and prescribe modern industrialization as the answer. They must clearly state: what is to be done<\/em><\/strong>. Whining to the master is proof to the master they are doing fine by their slave-driving. Meanwhile, Senior Presidential Advisor Duminda Hulangamuwa recently said the \u2018IMF is pushing the country to downsize its public sector employees from 1.3 million to 750,000\u2019, rather than retrain them for more productive work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     ee<\/em><\/strong> therefore reproduces the Communist Party of Sri Lanka (CPSL) statement questioning the Cabinet approval on 12 November to <\/strong>liquidate the State Development & Construction Corporation (SDCC)<\/strong>, a state enterprise operating under the Minister of Transport Vijitha Herath, specializing in heavy civil engineering construction projects<\/strong>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

SDCC was established in 1971 to undertake planning, designing &<\/p>\n\n\n\n

construction of single & multi-purpose development projects for irrigation,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

flood control, power, highways, water supply & drainage, land development<\/p>\n\n\n\n

& other similar projects, and the manufacture of concrete & concrete products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was also tasked with planning, designing & fabricating mechanical & electrical<\/p>\n\n\n\n

installations, extracting, manufacturing, importing & exporting construction raw<\/p>\n\n\n\n

materials, machinery & equipment, training of engineering & technical personnel<\/p>\n\n\n\n

and carrying out research, in connection with the above undertakings.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Corporation was envisaged as complementing the State Engineering Corporation,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

by undertaking infrastructural civil engineering work, and thereby<\/p>\n\n\n\n

enhancing the technological capabilities & industrialization<\/strong> of the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Who is going to do the digging? And how will they dig? And how deep must they go? (before they finally make it to the 21st<\/sup> century\u2026 and finally discovering China?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

___________<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contents:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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US Grabs for Sri Lanka\u2019s Graphite as Cabinet Liquidates State Construction Corporation<\/a><\/blockquote>