NPP - few successes, a plethora of broken promises

Prior to the presidential and parliamentary elections, the National People’s Power (NPP) led by President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, leader of the largest political group within the NPP, and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP),  promised the electorate to lower the cost of living and lead a corruption-free government.

The party promised, should they be elected, they would take immediate measures to rectify the problems associated with poverty. Their solution was simplistic. The party would renegotiate the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Extended Funding Facility Agreement which helped bring a degree of economic stability to the country after its descent into bankruptcy.

The president’s party (the NPP) claimed conditions laid down by the IMF placed intolerable burdens on deprived sections of the community. It promised  to renegotiate the IMF agreement,  and in this way lower the cost of living! 

The simplistic JVP/NPP’s proposed solution to the problem of poverty, brought to mind another simplistic solution proposed by the JVP prior to its abortive attempt to capture power via an armed struggle in 1971. At that time the country was facing a chronic food shortage as well as a shortfall in foreign currency to import basic needs.

The JVP’s proposed solution to the food shortage at that time, was to uproot tea bushes in the hill country and re-plant the estates with potatoes!

However, after its electoral victories, the new government found the IMF was not willing to accept any changes to the agreement. Strangely, government soon began speaking in glowing terms of the IMF agreement though the cost of living remained beyond the means of the poor. A WFP report in late 2024 showed around 25% of the population living below the poverty line.

Another pre-election promise of government was to bring corrupt politicians to book. Initially, the government lived up to its word. More recently though, corruption charges have been made against ministers of Cabinet rank.  The ‘Daily Mirror’ reported the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption had initiated investigations into alleged assets of six ministers of the current NPP government under the Money Laundering Act.

At an international level,  the NPP earlier strongly supported Palestinian rights and condemned the Israeli genocide in Palestine. Today,  it has suddenly gone silent on this subject. People are left wondering if support shown to the Palestinian cause was merely to garner votes among the Muslim community.

Making a bad situation worse, just days ago our Deputy Foreign Minister visited Israel, but completely avoided visiting Palestine. Sources claim a meeting with the Palestinian FM had been arranged, but our Deputy FM unexpectedly dropped the meeting.

It was while the government was failing to live up to its pre-election promises that Cyclone Ditwah struck. It left thousands of homes destroyed. The UNDP reported 720,000 buildings affected by the cyclone.

Over 16,000 km of road were submerged, and 270 km of railway track was damaged. Over 480 bridges were damaged,  and agriculture destroyed. It is estimated that the economic loss from Ditwah stands around $6 billion to $7 billion.

Speaking in parliament after the cyclone, President Dissanayake promised all persons whose homes were adversely affected by the cyclone would be paid an initial sum of Rs. 25,000/-.Another 75,000/- was to be paid in two instalments. With approximately 720,000 buildings adversely affected,if Rs.  75,000/- was to be paid as relief to victims, it would cost the government around Rs. 54 billion (at Rs. 300/- per US dollar) for this alone. 

The Media meanwhile reported that aid received by December 6 amounted to a little  more than USD 6.59 million. This sum is insufficient to pay the 720,000 victims who lost their homes as well as to attend to other urgent necessities such as road and rail repairs etc.

Not surprisingly, the government made payment only to a small fraction of the cyclone victims. With stagnant wages colliding with soaring costs, today trade unions are taking to the streets and could bring the economy to a halt. The government is facing a no win situation as our international debts too, keep mounting.

The need of the hour is to bring all sectors together to face the crisis. Our government needs to admit it was ill-prepared to meet the fallout from Ditwah. It needs to join hands with other political parties, trade unions and farmers to help not only those who were adversely affected, but to restart the flagging economy.