CLASSIFIED | POLITICS | TERRORISM | OPINION | VIEWS

WASTE IN SRI LANKA by POLITICIANS

ASOKA S.

Recently my 80 year old mother was admitted to a local nursing home in Maharagama area for severe ailment on her feet. The specialist who treated her charged a very reasonable RS. 600 per visit. But there was a big problem The nursing home was infested with cockroaches and hygiene conditions were far from acceptable.

A few days later we had her transferred to Asiri hospital. The same specialist visited her but his price went up from SLR 600 per day to SLR 2000 per day. Now this is the same doctor with same type of examination and expert care. The cost of Asiri for 3 days was almost SLR 50000 compared to the minor cost at the local Nursing Home.

For my family this was not an issue as we could afford it. But think of the vast majority of Lankan people who has to end up in a filthy nursing home. More importantly I cannot understand how the specialist charges rocketed from 600 to 2000 SLR.

Yes, this is nothing new in fact. We are a poor country where the rich can afford the top notch medical care while the vast majority of people who are poor has to end up with 3rd grade care and conditions. But what is worrisome is how some politicians go on huge spending sprees on overseas trips.

Take the case of our Foreign Minister Bogollagama who was in Washington, DC few weeks ago. Not only he booked into the very classy and expensive Ritz Carlton in New York he was accompanied by his wife and a whole array of bodyguards who are senior police officers from Sri Lanka. What is wrong with him traveling with the bare minimum people needed to carry out his duties, whatever they are? Nobody is going to harm him in the US. Minister spent a whole day in Washington, DC attending a Dana ceremony along with all his bodyguards and the entourage. Was this necessary at a huge cost to the Lankan people? He was not doing any productive work for Lankan people but wasting time at a cost to Lankan people. All his entourage was hanging out while the Minister was making his presence to a Dhana ceremony for better part of a day.

There are many Sri Lankans in Washington, DC region who spend their valuable time and money to lobby against the LTTE by meeting with Senators, Congressman to present the case for the government. They use their own money for these activities and make an invaluable contribution to Sri Lanka. These are in fact silent soldiers. They were very upset to see that our own Leaders wasting valuable Lankan resources for useless activities that don't bring an ounce of benefit to the motherland.

Given the 107 member Sri Lankan cabinet one can imagine the millions of dollars wasted daily. Think of how many things we can do with this money. Have smaller scale hospitals in major towns for the poor. Build a road or two in the major cities to ease traffic congestion. Equip the exiting hospitals with better equipment. Add more waste collection trucks to remove garbage decorating almost all our streets with filthy trash and crows. Build a few Technical Colleges in towns to train the youth of job skills. The list can be endless. Instead why do we waste money on useless politicians for foreign trips, bodyguards, spouse travel?

Since when did our leaders totally lose their common sense? Why can't the leaders act more wisely with public money? If the money was their own will they be wasting it like this?

While Prez Rajapaksha has earned respect of the people for his victories against the brutal LTTE he surely can earn more respect by cleaning house as early as possible. Perhaps he is pumping millions of dollars to keep politicians happy to keep his parliamentary majority till he wipe out the LTTE. Or is he being yet another Lankan Leader who lacks wisdom to address common sense problems but yet enriching his party people?

There need to be a sea change in outlook of the Lankan Political Landscape if ever we are to move to the top league in his century. The old village rich and strongman and their henchmen running the show, political interference into government run institutes and the Police, mile long motorcades and bodyguards, favoritism to friend and family, running the government run entities by brother in laws of a politico, useless overseas trips, politicians wasting time and money on 5 star hotel weddings and other conferences all need to go to the trash can. Instead a business like leadership need to take over. Most importantly common sense need to be restored to leaders' heads.

This is how the rich countries got rich. Disciplined and hard work by leaders with one common purpose -- to uplift the people who elected them lead. This is not easy but that is the difference between the ordinary run of the mill leaders verses the great; the type of Lee Kwan Yew, Dr Mahathir, Mrs Thatcher, Franklin Roosevelt and the like.

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