{"id":92914,"date":"2019-09-10T12:59:26","date_gmt":"2019-09-10T19:59:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=92914"},"modified":"2019-09-10T12:59:26","modified_gmt":"2019-09-10T19:59:26","slug":"national-security-and-the-economy-of-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/09\/10\/national-security-and-the-economy-of-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"NATIONAL SECURITY AND THE ECONOMY OF SRI LANKA"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The biggest mistake done by the\nyahapalana regime was neglecting the economy and national security and these\ntwo vital areas have clearly understood by Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa.  The current unofficial presidential campaign\nshows that except Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa, all other buoyant presidential\ncandidates are reluctant to talk about the national security and voters especially\nSinhala voters doubt about these presidential hopefuls, why they are reluctant\nto talk about the national security and why they are behaving like stupids\nwithout ensuring the national security. \nIf these presidential hopefuls are reluctant to talk about the national\nsecurity people\/voters of the country doubt whether they love to the country. Are\nthere powerful people behind them against the national security of Sri Lanka is\nan unresolved question to voters when compared to Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa and\nmany have a strong question whether these presidential hopefuls talking for\nmoney than working for the country. Therefore, people have strong confidence in\nMr. Rajapaksa’s policies as he practically demonstrated his abilities and the\nstrength of policy implementation process during the Rajapaksa regime.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yahapalana advocates persistent with a\nutopian state model, which was\/is believed to achieve many irrelevant things in\nthe country, but ordinary people of the country are not interested in such\ntargets as they would not deliver caress benefits to them.  The best example for this is the behaviour of\nLakehouse publications, which are publishing many irrelevant matters and people\nwho are intending to vote for candidates opposite Mr. Gotabaya will change the\nmind not to vote for candidates against Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa as Lakehouse\npublications make too many lies to the country like Arjuna behaved in 1970s.\nThe other real trend in Sri Lanka is that Sinhala people of the country is\nuniting with Mr. Rajapaksa as the yahapalana advocates attempted to divide the\nnation for political purposes and minor communities such as Tamil and Muslim in\nthe country supported to this division of Sinhala people as it bolsters them to\ngain unreasonable advantages from politics and mess-ups the country.  Yahapalana advocates love messing the country\nfocusing on unnecessary issues than achieving what people needs from firmed\npolicies on the economy and the national security would be a hindrance to them\nmaking money and other benefits from foreign NGOs.  The real experience in the country during the\npast century indicated that political parties openly talked about unimportant\nissues but people who did not listen to such useless points of armchair\ncriticism. People want active solutions for the issues, which are the economy\nand national security. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The economy and national security is\nthe priority of all countries in the world including the USA, China, Russia,\nIndia, Europe, Japan and South Korea and others.  If any candidate ignores the two vital areas\nvoters in Sri Lanka will regard, she\/he is not suitable to be president and\nvoting for such a candidate would be wasting votes.  Thinking in this line Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa\nis in front.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The right-wing politicians publicly\nexpressed that they will convert Sri Lanka to a Singapore without understanding\nthe realities.  The main difference\nbetween Sri Lanka and Singapore is the size of the population in each\ncountry.  Sri Lanka has 22 million\npopulation, which is double compared to Singapore, where has a strong market\nsurrounding countries with a small population. \nIf Sri Lanka\u2019s population is less than 10 million like in Singapore, the\nper capita income of Sri Lanka would have the US $ 12000 per year and such a\nsituation is theoretically developed status with potential to a higher level of\ngrowth.  The other best example is the\nsize of Sri Lanka\u2019s economy is equivalent to New Zealand but people of Sri\nLanka do not economically enjoy people like in NZ because of the higher\npopulation of Sri Lanka naturally prevent the economic benefits of people.  Late 1950s Sri Lanka identified issues about\nthe size population, the rate of population growth and skills related issues,\nbut the proposed plans to gradually resolve the issues were not successfully implemented\ndue to misguided policies of so-called left politicians\u2019 attitudes or beliefs.\nKarl Marx would have told a person born with one mouth and two hands it is not\npractical in modern technologically advanced states.  Although the idea of Marx was relevant to his\nera it is completely irrelevant to the modern era. Now Sri Lanka is facing a\nserious issue of an aging population and without the ability to deal with\nrelated issues. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The liberal economic policies\nintroduced in 1978 identified the prime issue of opening the economy, despite\nthe requirement of essential disciplines for liberal policies and the economic\nadvocates failed to develop a regulatory framework for the stability of the\ncountry. The national security should have given priority since the early 1980s\nand the benefits of market economic policy expanded only to regional Sri Lanka\nwith a higher rate of inflation created by government spending, which helped to\ngive a reasonable price to products and services of rural people.  The regime of Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa honestly\nattempted to tackle issues facing with terrorism.  During the regime of Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa\ndid many things but unable to control population, governance-related issues and\nrapid modernization consistent with technology. \nThe Rajapaksa regime honestly attempted to expand the economic\ndevelopment to the rural area, however, it was failed to convince people that\nthe government policy was to refocus economy to attract rural people after\ndefeating the terrorism.  When the Rajapaksa\nregime was defeated in 2015, the yahapalana people did not know what to do and\nhow to do.  The advocates of yahapalana\nbehaved like ladies who were crying for money consuming local alcohol in\nfuneral houses without understanding the economic and security related issues.\nWhat should do to get out of the issues? \nIn this background, policy-makers in Sri Lanka need lateral thinking to\nfind solutions and I would like to mention Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa to use his\nteam to develop policies and procedures for the following areas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri Lanka needs developing own economic\nsystem, which is not aligning to any country and the market of all countries\nUSA, China, India, Russia, Europe and all other countries of the world are\nvital to make a strong export economy. \nThere is an intensive competition to capture the market and the\ncompetition between the USA and China gain leadership of the world influences\nforces Sri Lanka to stay non-align stand as the country shouldn\u2019t play politics\nwith these countries.  Managed capitalism\nshould be the prime strategy, which helps everyone to be rich if they work hard\nand internationally competitive.  There\nis no doubt that Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa has good economic and security\npolicies, however, I like to point out vital areas that should be worthwhile\nconsidering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Modernization must be the slogan,\ncatchphrase or motto of the new government. \nModernization should expand to all activities including security,\neconomic, social and cultural activities concentrating on changing the\nattitudes of people, focusing on creating a responsible community for all\nactivities of the country. People of Sri Lanka are highly irresponsible and\nthey are used to pass the bug but the country needs a disciplined society.  The best example for this is Japan where had\nbeen implemented modernization since Meiji restoration and modernization\nentirely changed the attitudes of Japanese people.  The world economic forecast doesn’t look\nbright as IMF forecasted that the annual growth rate would be 3% and many\nwestern countries may go to a global recession and Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa might\nnot able to do all what people are expecting, he must show he is capable of\ndoing not like Mr. Sajith Premadasa playing double game and talking bullshit in\nfront of an educated society.                                              <\/p>\n\n\n\n

  • Enhancement\nof productivity.  <\/strong>The productivity of employees in the\nPublic and Private sectors are lower and while increasing pay, productivity\nenhancement must be used as a part of life. Employees of Sri Lanka are highly\nsatisfied with the increase in monetary wages than real wages and it needs\npolicy development for productivity enhancement and increases in real wages\nbased on the productivity of employees <\/li>
  • Enhancement\nof Product Quality.<\/strong>  This is the biggest challenge.  No body like to give hard earned money for\nlow quality products and services as what happened during the SLFP regime from\n1956.  Encourage people to produce\nquality products and services using technology.<\/li>
  •  Development of product and service quality. <\/strong>  Product development and product quality\ndevelopment are essential factors in export development.  This is not only for the industrial area, but\nit should be in all areas including social, cultural and religious areas, where\nquite behind and Sri Lanka has a difficult to attract tourists and the market\nbecause of current weaknesses.<\/li>
  • Enhancement\nof competitiveness.<\/strong>\nWhy Sri Lanka has a difficulty to attract export market because products of Sri\nLanka are not competitive.  For this\npurpose, Sri Lanka needs learning many advises from China and working with\nChina to enhance the competitiveness of products and services.  We can see that employees wearing clean\nsuites, but they no competitiveness like the dress.  This is a problem with attitudes. <\/li>
  • Expansion\nof share ownership of the country<\/strong> creating regional stock markets in all districts and combine\nvalue of regional markets should list in CSE. \nThis will boost employment opportunities and improve the stock ownership\nof rural people in a process of converting rural poor to be wealthier. The\npolicy will create social democracy in the country.  No capital should be involved in public\ncompanies, but the government must observe the operations and provide advice in\nvarious ways.  This type of program\nsupports to promote products and services development and marketing related\nactivities.  It would give ownership of\nthe rural economy to rural people without government spending.  This program would create more than one\nmillion new jobs to the country and stop sending women to the middle east. <\/li>
  • Expanding\nof the ownership of public enterprises <\/strong>offering shares of public corporations\nto rural people through above mentioned public companies. A Considerable\npercentage of shares of public companies should give to foreigners such as\npeople in China, India, Malaysia, Korea, Japan, Russia, and other countries.  This will ensure gaining company management skills by regional people, who will become owners of the\nwealth of Sri Lanka.  The action improves\nthe foreign exchange earnings by US $10 billion and radically increase in\nforeign assets improving Sri Lanka\u2019s Rupee value to US 0.50 cents. And reduce\ngovernment spending and create an excess budget. (I will write further on how\nto change the economy) <\/li><\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS The biggest mistake done by the yahapalana regime was neglecting the economy and national security and these two vital areas have clearly understood by Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa.  The current unofficial presidential campaign shows that except Mr. Gotabaya Rajapaksa, all other buoyant presidential candidates are reluctant to talk about the national security and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92914","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-edward-theophilus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92914","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=92914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92914\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}