{"id":63637,"date":"2017-02-21T17:37:35","date_gmt":"2017-02-22T00:37:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=63637"},"modified":"2017-02-21T17:37:35","modified_gmt":"2017-02-22T00:37:35","slug":"hashim-puts-the-screws-on-ravi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2017\/02\/21\/hashim-puts-the-screws-on-ravi\/","title":{"rendered":"HASHIM PUTS THE SCREWS on RAVI"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em><strong>By Dhammika Ranaweera\u00a0Courtesy \u00a0Ceylon Today<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>A determined stand-off between Minister of Public Enterprises Development Kabir Hashim and the Finance Ministry at yesterday&#8217;s Cabinet meeting sent emotions&#8230;&#8230; roaring in connection with a clash of opinions on the amount of compensation to be paid for cancellation of an agreement signed by the previous regime to purchase aircraft.<br \/>\nHashim objected to the Finance Ministry&#8217;s cancellation compensation estimate of US$ 154 million though Cabinet had agreed on a payment of between USS 75-85 million.<br \/>\nInformed sources said the previous UPFA regime had signed an agreement with Aircap Corporation in 2012 to purchase several aircraft.<\/p>\n<p>However, the current government had decided to cancel that agreement on the basis that the intended purchase was not necessary.<br \/>\nAs a result of that agreement being cancelled the government was under compulsion to pay compensation to the afore-mentioned firm, with the Cabinet agreeing to it.<br \/>\nThe sum of compensation had been ratified by Cabinet after a Cabinet Sub-Committee formed to look into the matter sanctioned it.<\/p>\n<p>However, sources revealed that Minister Hashim had pointed out at the Cabinet meeting yesterday that the decision taken by the Finance Ministry to pay a hefty sum as compensation, having disregarded the amount agreed by the subject Minister and the Cabinet, was unethical and was an arbitrary decision.<br \/>\nThe source added that Minister Patali Ranawaka and Dr. Sarath Amunugama had also spoken in support of Minister Kabir Hashim at the Cabinet meeting.<\/p>\n<p>It is also learnt that President Maithripala Sirisena has advised the Finance Ministry to temporarily suspend the payment of compensation to Aircap Corporation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Dhammika Ranaweera\u00a0Courtesy \u00a0Ceylon Today A determined stand-off between Minister of Public Enterprises Development Kabir Hashim and the Finance Ministry at yesterday&#8217;s Cabinet meeting sent emotions&#8230;&#8230; roaring in connection with a clash of opinions on the amount of compensation to be paid for cancellation of an agreement signed by the previous regime to purchase aircraft. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-106"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63637","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=63637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63637\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}