Only in Sri Lanka!!! Presidential Self-Deprecation
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Sri Lanka’s Central Bank under the Spotlight
Chandrasena Maliyadde, in Daily Ft, 20 July 2022, with this title “Central Bank, its independence and us”
An expert panel discussion on ‘Surviving the Current Economic Crisis: Ex-Central Bankers in Dialogue’ was held in early June. Some speakers stressed that the need of the hour is an independent Central Bank (CBSL). But its relevance or impact on surviving the current economic crisis was not spelt out. Maybe we ignorant laymen could not understand. Perhaps independence may be for the survival of the Central Bank and its officers who spend time in aiconditioned rooms away from the crisis.
Former Central Bank Governors: Nandalal Weerasinghe, Ajith Cabraal & WD Lakshman
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The American & IMF Bear in Sri Lanka’s Drawing Room
Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake, in InDepthNow, July 2022 ….. https://www.indepthnews.net/index.php/opinion/5466-the-elephant-in-the-room-geopolitics-and-the-great-reset-in-sri-lanka …. where the title is “The Elephant in the Room: …”
“But to watch cricket, there has to be a country left for us to watch it in, no?” A fan at the Galle Test Match that ended with an innings victory for Sri Lanka. July 11, 2022.
Spirits were high on July 11 when the Sri Lankan cricket team beat the visiting Aussies by an innings even though the country was in its worst economic crisis ever due to a lack of Dollars to buy fuel caused by an International Sovereign Bond (ISB), debt trap and Staged Default.
The cricket victory followed a magical weekend in which the Aragalaya, or peoples’ struggle, exceeded all expectations, staging multiple coups to peacefully claim both the Presidential Palace and the Prime Minister’s official residence. Massive waves of protestors unseated the island’s President and PM without a single person killed in the gunfire. Later the protestors cooled off in the Presidential pool and had impromptu concerts celebrating what appeared to be a successful regime change operation.
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An Unimaginable Outcome from the ARAGALA Revolt: Ranil As President
Malinda Seneviratne, in his web column https://malindawords.blogspot.com/2022/07/the-aragalaya-postscript.html
Ranil Wickremesinghe is no longer president in an acting capacity. He is the president, period. Did someone say ‘I don’t know whether to laugh or cry?’ I am pretty sure someone did. Did someone say, ’who wudda thunk?’ Well, if two or three years ago, if anyone suggested that in July 2023 Ranil Wickremesinghe would be the president of this country, there would have been laughter and tears, if at all, would have been of mirth.
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Was Sri Lanka an Agricultural Nation in Ancient Times?
Vinod Moonesinghe, in an original essay bearing the title “Agricultural nation, a myth?” ……… … now reproduced with a different title and with highlIghting imposed by The Editor, ThuppaHI
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” — L.P. Hartley, The go-between
Recent shortages of milk powder, wheat flour and even rice have brought into perspective Sri Lanka’s lack of food security. The situation has been exacerbated by growing dependence on imports of wheat – which rose from half a million tonnes in 1980 to nearly 1.5 million tonnes in 2020. This lack of food security has re-kindled an argument about the role of agriculture in Sri Lanka’s economy, which has extended into the realms of historiography.
When former secretary general of UNCTAD Gamini Corea wrote “Sri Lanka has always been predominantly an agricultural economy since ancient times,” he reflected historical orthodoxy. However, a revisionist historical school has emerged, holding that this view of Sri Lanka, as an agricultural country, the granary of the East, reflects a myth. For example, Former Central Bank deputy governor WA Wijewardena says that “A widely-held view by many Sri Lankans is that Sri Lanka was an agriculture-based economy in the past and it should be so even in the future. The first part of this argument is only half-true.”He thinks that in the ancient past, Sri Lanka had an “open economy”, in which trade occupied as important a place as agriculture.
The Northways in British Ceylon …. and Beyond
Fred David Graham, responding to a Query in Thuppahi from Debbie Northway**
There are quite a few mentions of people named Northway living in Ceylon in the 19th century and early 20th century in pamphlets and books like Lewis J. Penry’s List of Inscriptions on Tombstones and Monuments in Ceylon, of Historical or Local Interest, With an Obituary of Persons Uncommemorated. Also Harry Storey’s A Ceylon Sportsman’s Diary, William Sabonadière’s The Coffee Planter of Ceylon (1866), The Ceylon Almanac and Annual Register for the Year of Our Lord 1855 (p.345), Herbert Wright’s Hevea Brasiliensis or Para Rubber: Its Botany, Cultivation, Chemistry and Diseases (1908) and Charles Edmond Akers’s The Rubber Industry in Brazil and the Orient.
British planters at a tasting of Ceylon tea at the tea estate Continue reading
Babar Azam: Leading ODI Batsman in Exquisite Test Innings
Andrew Fidel Fernando, in ESPNcricinfo, 17 July 2022, where the title reads “World-class Babar Azam constructs an innings that only he can”
Babar Azam is the top-ranked ODI batter, 77 rankings points ahead of the next guy (Imam-ul-Haq). He is also the top-ranked T20I batter but is ahead of the second by a slimmer margin (Mohammad Rizwan is 24 points back).
In Tests, though, the format that matters, the purists’ format, the thing that gets you into Wisden, he’s ranked a paltry fourth. Above him Joe Root (obviously), Steven Smith (partially riding on past glories), and Marnus Labuschagne (originally a discounted Steven Smith who has now proved more popular in the market since the rumours that the original has declined in quality).
Babar Azam thanks the Almighty after reaching his seventh Test ton•AFP/Getty ImagesSri Lanka’s Crisis: Meeting Fair Dinkum & Thuppahi Foursquare
Prithi Perera
Allow me please to be as brief as possible in responding to the Positions taken by Fair Dinkum” and Thuppahi.
Falsehood 1. As genuine Sri Lankans, we should not want to be colonized by anyone of the big powers, be it US, China and or for that matter, Western Europe or India.
Falsehood 2. As such, based on 1, being a fifth column of Russia becomes irrelevant. Therefore, no need for any pipe !!
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