{"id":52188,"date":"2016-02-19T22:57:13","date_gmt":"2016-02-20T04:57:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=52188"},"modified":"2016-02-19T15:38:32","modified_gmt":"2016-02-19T22:38:32","slug":"daily-protests-foretell-impending-regime-collapse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/02\/19\/daily-protests-foretell-impending-regime-collapse\/","title":{"rendered":"Daily Protests Foretell Impending Regime Collapse"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<h2 id=\"yui_3_16_0_1_1455890521737_20615\" dir=\"ltr\"><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>\u00a0Dilrook Kannangara<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">Large protests have become an almost daily occurrence. Various cross sections of the society are affected by the incompetence of the government. Every step the government takes, it trespasses on people\u2019s rights. Things will get even worse when IMF lays down tough conditions for the intended loan facility. Already $2 billion have been syphoned out of the country within a period of months with very serious effects on the balance of payment, economic growth and loan repayment. Promised Belgian money launderer failed to appear. UNP\u2019s economic disaster is inexcusable at a time when petroleum is selling at a record low saving billions in the import bill.<\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_1_1455890521737_20760\" dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_1_1455890521737_20870\" dir=\"ltr\">Sensing the impending end, ministers are very busy \u2018saving\u2019 for a rainy day. Allegations of corruption keep rising and their value increasing. Ministers and MPs need at least 100 million rupees each to run a successful election campaign. As none has such a lot of money of their own, it must come from state coffers.<\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_1_1455890521737_20871\" dir=\"ltr\">\nDisruptions to Chinese projects cost dearly in penalties, rework and cost overruns. These are yet to be felt. Slowing of the global economy will also impact export earnings and foreign direct investments. If ETCA is signed, hundreds of thousands will lose their livelihood. If it is not signed, India, as the biggest financier of the 2013-2015 regime change operation will turn against the regime. If war crimes investigations are done by foreigners, locals will escalate political tensions making the government unpopular. If not done, the international backers of this government will pull the plug.<\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_1_1455890521737_21207\" dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_1_1455890521737_21209\" dir=\"ltr\">Faced with these insurmountable problems, the regime has scaled back its ambitious constitution amendments. Clamping down on opposition members has worsened. Elections have been postponed indefinitely. Shadows of 2004 are now cast upon this UNP government. The President, in order to save himself and the political future of the Kumaratunga clan, will not hesitate to change the Prime Minister or even dissolve the parliament if things go too bad. His only comfort is that the Joint Opposition is highly disorganised, without a plan and has been unable to sell a bold action plan.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0Dilrook Kannangara Large protests have become an almost daily occurrence. Various cross sections of the society are affected by the incompetence of the government. Every step the government takes, it trespasses on people\u2019s rights. Things will get even worse when IMF lays down tough conditions for the intended loan facility. Already $2 billion have been [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dilrook-kannangara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52188","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=52188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52188\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}