Let’s make smart New Year resolutions

With this festive week leading up to New Year’s Day on Monday, January 1, most people these days think and reflect on New Year resolutions, which are often...

Sri Lanka’s wait for Godot

Sri Lanka’s perennial quest for national leadership continues. Of late it has assumed proportions bordering on desperation. So many figureheads who....

Culture of Impunity is part of our political psyche – Dr. Deepika Udagama

The culture of Impunity is part of our political psyche. When democracy fails the Democratic Institutions crumble and they are unable to function in an...

Do local government elections really matter?

Thirty five thousand (35,000) candidates are vying for their places in three hundred and forty one (341) local bodies in the forthcoming local government....

Legally impossible to accept nominations for six new Pradeshiya Sabhas

Senior lawyer Kalyananda Tiranagama, in an email interview with The , challenged the creation of six new local authorities in Nuwara Eliya. Following are excerpts of the interview done with Tiranagama.

When they are gone, we will miss them

A magnificent tusker, Dala Poottuwa to the villagers, has been callously brought down for possessing two magnificiant tusks. 

Maldives wriggles out of a sticky diplomatic situation vis-à-vis India

The Maldives has managed to wriggle out of a sticky diplomatic situation involving regional power India, thanks to President Abdulla Yameen’stimely conciliatory move, and the Indian government’s deft handling of the matter behind the scenes instead of flexing its muscles publicly.

Russian tea ban: The need to play nice with big powers

Two weeks ago, Russia slapped a ban on tea from Sri Lanka, ostensibly due to a solitary beetle allegedly found in a tea consignment.

Discover heart of Christ this Christmas

We all remember how the country was wrecked with wind and rain only a few weeks ago. Most of the people had to go through severe inconvenience of spending an entire night without electricity.

IS Sri Lanka becoming Man-Eating-Man society?

They too have gone back inevitably on their pledges. The Bond Commission unmistakably has revealed startling evidence of the involvement of key politicians.

A novel approach for land use planning

The Dailymirror interviewed H.G. Gunawardane, Coordinator - Landscape Planning and Management Component, Ecosystem Conservation and Management Project. Funded by the World Bank, the project is executed by the Ministry of Mahaweli Development and Environment.

DMK abandons separatism; captures State power in TN

Thamizhan Illaathaa Naadumillai. Thamizhanukkendroru Naadumillai (There is no country without Tamils. There is no country for Tamils) is a saying in Tamil that vividly illustrates the angst felt by the more nationalist sections of Tamils about the lack of a country of their own - an independent sovereign self-governing Tamil state!

The madness of missiles.

The nuclear weapon missile business is contradictory, full of missteps, highly dangerous and prepared in its madness (Mutually Assured Destruction, aka MAD, they used to call it in Cold War days) to plunge the world into a nuclear war that will reduce most of the world to dust.  

Education is not examinations only

In the Vision 2025 programme for sustainable, eco-friendly and all-inclusive development, the National Unity Government has quite rightly given the highest priority to education. All students in public, 

Democracy is best practised when elections are held on schedule

Nominations closed yesterday for one of Sri Lanka’s biggest ever elections to 341 Municipal, Urban Council and Pradeshiya Sabhas. 

punishing voters for electing rogues

The television channels showed on Monday a man weeping after his name allegedly had been struck off from a nomination paper despite a promise to include him in the list by the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) led by former President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Christmas message from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference Christmas manifests God’s unfathomable love

It is the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem that we celebrate at Christmas. It is God’s entry into human history in the person of Jesus, the Saviour of the world. 

My Christmas wish for Sinhala Buddhists

Last weekend I read somewhere, the MEP that’s in tow with the flower bud (Pohottuwa) Party with Rajapaksa at its helm, has lost one of their strongest Urban Councils with nominations for the Maharagama UC among few others getting rejected.

Jerusalem: Trump plays Harod for Christmas

Pardon me for visiting you with another article on Jerusalem. 

Unplanned development Projects of Rajapaksa

We have not sold anything but only leased out. If you take Hambantota after seventy years we will become the major share holder

The battle for Sovereignty

Not too long ago when economic, social, political circumstances were not too different to what we have now in Sri Lanka there were some individuals who shouted themselves hoarse insisting that Sri Lanka was a failed state. Maybe they’ve quite lost their throats now. 

Inter-racial and inter-religious solidarity alliance

Yesterday the United Nations marked the International Human Solidarity Day, with the main objective being unity in diversity—a vital factor for all countries to make progress and specially significant for Sri Lanka in the aftermath of the 26-year ethnic war and the intensified effort being made now for 

Realistically futuristic in 2020

Elections can’t be held for another 24 months-till 2020- due to the stupidity evolved by the‘pundits’ on the 19th amendment. Manipulations have placed the UNP in serious trouble. If local Government elections aren’t held in early 2018 – the UNP will lose more votes- for not keeping to the scheduled 

Pakistan and friends advised SL against co-sponsoring UNHRC resolution on it

Renowned Pakistani diplomat Zamir Akram, in an email interview with the Daily Mirror spoke about Sri Lanka-Pakistan relations, the UNHRC process and the selective application of the international humanitarian law. Akram was the one time Pakistan Permanent Representative to the United Nations 

How Rajapaksaism destroyed the SLFP

There was no Machiavellian nuanced statecraft. There was no Dudley Senanayakian transparency and honesty. There was no Jayewardenesque stoicism. There was not even lofty but empty rhetoric of the likes of SWRD Bandaranaike. There was no veiled brilliance of a shrewd leader; only undisguised 

LOCAL GOVERNMENT ELECTIONS 1956 AND THE LAST JEDI

It is all very simple really. This election is about you. If you vote for the UNP, you think that the country is better off under Ranil, is doing better and will do better under him as PM than it did when Mahinda 

TEA IS OUR PRIDE

Tea is our pride, of which we can be proud of for the reason that it is the best tea on the Globe. It is the duty of every Sri Lankan -- especially our Diplomatic Missions worldwide to defend and promote 

Voter apathy at elections

The Tamil media has recently quoted Deputy Elections Commissioner M.M. Mohamed as saying that the voters who do not use their franchise should be fined as in some other countries. Justifying his 

Authorities to ‘COLLAR’ Tuskers under threat

News of five tuskers being shot dead inside two weeks made headlines in newspapers, thus raising doubts among authorities and....

Bond Commission Report: Moment of Truth for Country

The country is awaiting with a mix of excitement and trepidation the Report of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI) into the....