Lankan voter has grown up - EDITORIAL

The political developments in the run-up to the presidential polls on January 8 is getting ever more interesting every moment.

President took right decisions at right times

Child Development and Women’s Affairs Minister, Tissa Karalliyadda said having been in the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) for twenty years he will never desert the Party and will extend his support to the President.

Our policies concern all citizens

The Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) is to announce their stance on whether they would support the common opposition candidate Maithripala Sirisena at the upcoming presidential elections today.

Common opposition candidate takes Govt. unawares - EDITORIAL

The initial reaction of the United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) to the Opposition’s move to field one of the ruling coalition’s bigwigs as the Opposition’s common presidential candidate was not unexpected, though ludicrous. 

‘We have no issues with Ranil becoming the PM’

JVP Leader and parliamentarian Anura Kumara Dissanayake predicts the upcoming  polls will be the most violent Presidential elections ever to be held in the history of Sri Lanka.

Politics of the cancer stick - EDITORIAL

The World Health Organisation (WHO) in blazing imagery has described a smoker as “a fool at one end and a flame at the other.” During recent decades the Western countries have strictly implemented tough anti-smoking laws ........

I want to defeat this evil and corrupt system

Cabinet Minister of Public Management Reforms Navin Dissanayake who resigned and extended his support to the Common Presidential candidate Maithripala Sirisena yesterday said that he would commit himself to fight, what he termed an “evil and corrupt system”.

The price of ‘Medical Negligence’

Doctors are the final resort of many as they are the saviours who offer a ray of hope to the poor souls who look upon them with the pure intention of receiving cure for all their medical maladies. 

The Need to Foster Education

Public spending on education as a percentage of GDP in Sri Lanka has been on a steady decline over the last four decades. Educational spending recorded at 3.98% of GDP in 1967 declined to a very low level of 1.7% by 2012, despite the fact that the population in Sri Lanka.....

Obama’s report card

Will the real Barack Obama be allowed to stand up? The New York Times’ columnist and Nobel Prize winner for economics, Paul Krugman, writes in “Rolling Stone, “Obama has emerged as one of the most consequential presidents in American history”.

Corruption corruption: plunder of billions - EDITORIAL

On Wednesday, the Daily Mirror in an Editorial headlined, “Who blocked the Bibile policy; expose them”, asked the former Health Minister Maithripala Sirisena, the Opposition Common candidate for the presidency,  to name and shame those who had done this.

Opposition rattles sword of Damocles over Rajapaksa rule

Presidential contests have traditionally been battles between the two main parties, each of which fields its own candidate in the race. After nine years of Mahinda Rajapaksa’s rule, it was incumbent that the battle lines were redefined in order to effectively challenge the current morass of .....

How much lower can this mafia stoop?

“She doesn’t smoke doctor, but I do”; a distressed husband lamented.  Yes, the husband had smoked a packet of cigarettes a day through their married life of 23 years. The wife had been inhaling a lot of cigarette smoke through ‘passive smoking’.

Mutiny on SAARC ship; China can save it

When the eight leaders of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) met in Kathmandu, Nepal on Wednesday, the undercurrent was one of one-upmanship and the atmosphere underscored the truism that there is no altruism in politics. 

RTI to start righting the wrongs - EDITORIAL

French Nobel Prize winning author, journalist and philosopher Albert Camus has said a free media can be good or bad, but most certainly without freedom, the media will never be anything but bad. In a similar vein, veteran United States politician Christopher Dodd has...

Presidential Election Campaign Strategy looks more crucial than ever

Well in advance of the declaration of the presidential election on November 20, the United People’s Freedom Alliance(UPFA), the government party, worked out  campaign strategies and laid the necessary infrastructure to execute them.

On ‘Common Candidate’:Nobody knows where cart or horse is heading!

The surprise announcement that Maithripala Sirisena will be the common Presidential candidate who will face the current incumbent at the forthcoming elections....

What is it with us and scandalous Swamis?

Last week and after days of mayhem and bloodshed, an arrest long overdue took place just 175 kilometres from India’s capital New Delhi. 

Why it’s different this time - EDITORIAL

Those who try to belittle and mock the current development in the country’s political sphere stress with irony that the Opposition or rather United National Party Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe has found its new sacrifice.

I was the mastermind behind making Maithripala the common candidate

Last week, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) stalwart and its General Secretary Maithripala Sirisena’s decision to cross over to the opposition and his nomination as the common opposition candidate shocked the country.

In Search of a Statesman

This year, as I put pen to paper to commemorate the birth of a great Sri Lankan, the country is gearing for a decisive election. 

who blocked the bibile policy? expose them

On Friday November 21, the day on which Sri Lanka’s political scene took a historic turn, former Health Minister and the common opposition candidate Maithripala Sirisena made a shocking disclosure about what was happening in the vital health service.

Those who left will be isolated - Anura Priyadharshana Yapa

In an interview, the newly appointed Sri Lanka Freedom Party General Secretary, Minister Anura Priyadharshana Yapa spoke on the latest developments with regard to the upcoming presidential election and the political situation in the country. 

Creating a Noble Humane Environment

Development must necessarily mean Human Development. No development effort can be meaningful and fruitful unless and until the development is people-oriented and aimed to result in healthy human growth This requires optimization of available resources through an Integrated Development Plan. 

Let the people have the space to decide - EDITORIAL

Until President Mahinda Rajapaksa declared his intention by proclamation, to hold an early presidential election on November 20, a day after he completed four years of his current term, the Opposition seemed to be........

Democracy in Sri Lanka has a hope

It was indeed a pleasant surprise!  Last week’s political developments tell us that democracy in Sri Lanka is regenerating its own, even after much of its attributes were dismantled by the current regime.

We will shatter the coalition and isolate this govt.

Former Fisheries Minister Dr. Rajitha Senaratne has always cut a rebellious figure in the local political arena and this image was further boosted when he left the government on Friday to join the common opposition movement that has fielded SLFP stalwart......

Balancing malls and temples

Sri Lanka’s media landscape today is reflective of the inherently contradictory nature of modern human life.  On the one hand, there is hardly any TV channel in the country that does not give a prominent place to religious sermons, in particular....

EDITORIAL - Let the sovereign people make an informed choice

On November 5, President Percy Mahinda Rajapaksa perhaps unknowingly set off the ignition for what is turning out to be one of the most momentous and historic  periods in Sri Lanka. The use.....

Life and Times of Tiger Supremo Veluppillai Prabhakaran

If Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Thiruvengadam Veluppillai Prabhakaran was alive now, he would have celebrated his  60th birth anniversary on November 26th.