Loss-making CEB unions oppose restructuring, demand wage increase

Despite making an accumulated loss of Rs. 427 billion, CEB workers are today demanding they be paid a 40% increase in wages if they are to call off their strike action

Faced with continuous losses and no end in sight of a turnaround at the loss-making Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB),  Energy Minister Kumara Jayakody ultimately issued an Extraordinary Gazette Notification earlier this month establishing six successor companies to transfer the functions and duties of the CEB. 

An effort to restructure the loss-making entity and cut its losses.

Since its creation in 1969, the Electricity Board as it is commonly referred to, has been a chronic loss-making state-owned enterprise (SOE). Over the years the CEB has accumulated losses of around Rs. 427 billion. 

What is surprising however is the fact that the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP)-led NPP Government in earlier times always been in the forefront of opposing all and any effort to unbundle the monolith that is the CEB. The JVP in those days claimed restructuring was an attempt to sell off national assets. 

It (JVP) also claimed the moves were an attempt to abrogate worker rights. As recently as in December 2022, the JVP and the Ceylon Electricity Workers’ Union scuttled an attempt by the then government to restructure the CEB based on the report of a Cabinet-appointed Committee on Power Sector Reforms, which recommended the division of the debt ridden organisation into 14 companies with a 15th entity to take over any residual functions. 

In 2023 and early 2024, thanks to IMF-driven reforms, including cost-reflective pricing, the CEB briefly turned profitable. However, since December 2024, the board was back in the red. In the first quarter of 2025 the CEB posted a Rs. 18 billion loss. It turned profitable in the second quarter, reporting a profit of Rs. 5.31 billion for the quarter ending 30 June 2025. 

Despite the second-quarter turnaround, the CEB posted a net loss of Rs. 9.58 billion for the first nine months of 2025. Worse was to follow in the fourth quarter of 2025, the Board reported a Rs. 29.15 billion loss.   At the beginning of this year the CEB requested a 13.56% increase in electricity tariffs for the second quarter of 2026 to cover an estimated revenue deficit of Rs. 15.8 billion! 

In the face of continuous losses and facing strictures from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and wrath of the people over another possible tariff hike, the NPP Government, issued an extraordinary gazette notification promulgating the unbundling of the monolithic CBE. It has established six successor companies which would take over the functions and duties of the CEB.

Unsurprisingly workers and unions who had earlier been ‘educated’ by the self-same JVP that such moves were infringement of their rights, they protested the move. They even took strike action to safeguard the benefits they were receiving.  

Believe it or not, despite making continuous losses, workers are demanding bonus payments. Again despite making an accumulated loss of Rs. 427 billion, CEB workers are today demanding they be paid a 40% increase in wages if they are to call off their strike action.

Solar power, wind power and geothermal power also seem an anathema to engineering staff at the CEB. They claim alternative sources of power generation, especially rooftop solar pose significant technical challenges to Sri Lanka’s power grid. The JVP, then in Opposition, did not dispute the claims of CEB engineering staff.

Yet, Greece’s energy mix reached 50% of its total energy mix by January 2024, and China is the world’s largest investor in and producer of renewable energy, invested $625 billion in 2024. It appears engineering staff at the CEB are either simply not competent or have ulterior motives for their pessimism re problems regarding alternative sources of power generation and energy mix.

Sadly the JVP made no effort to contradict the falsehoods spread by engineering staff of the CEB, regarding the problems posed by use of alternative sources of power generation. Today – now in the seat of power – the NPP Government, is faced with a problem of its own making.

It reminds us of the proverb ‘he who sows the wind reaps the whirlwind’ – spreading falsehoods comes back to bite you resulting in adverse consequences.