The Hon. Chamara Sampath Dasanayake

¶ 01 Hon. Presiding Member, I am pleased to speak in the final segment of the debate on the Heads of the Ministries of Buddha Sasana, Religious and Cultural Affairs, and of Environment.

¶ 02 The Environment Ministry safeguards the nation’s environment. The Clean Sri Lanka programme should proceed in tandem with it. Hon. Minister, it seems Clean Sri Lanka has stalled. Earlier, some Ministers went into tanks, cleaned roads and beaches—now it appears paused. Do not use the military or prison inmates for Clean Sri Lanka; in opposition you yourself objected to that. Engage the 100,000 recruits you hired for such work? No—rather, empower local authorities: municipal and urban councils already employ road and waste workers; fill their vacancies and let them do the job daily, not as a one-off photo-op with office staff sweeping for two hours and going home.

¶ 03 Also today’s news showed Minister Samantha Vidyaratne claiming Chandrika Bandaranaike and Ranil Wickremesinghe went to the same school and were classmates—nonsense. Ranil attended Royal College, a boys’ school; they could not have been classmates. That false claim even aired on Derana. Verify before speaking.

¶ 04 You kept talking about Mahinda Rajapaksa’s house for months; yet he still resides there. You said you would evict him, go to court—nothing happened. Now, with that topic exhausted, you have latched onto “Batalanda” again; it will linger for two months and fade, like past distractions.

¶ 05 The Environment Ministry houses key agencies, but some institutions that should be under it have been placed elsewhere this time. Nevertheless, in Sri Lanka you cannot do anything significant without environmental reports and permits. The process to obtain them is slow and hinders people. The Ministry must act faster and tangibly so citizens feel the change.

¶ 06 The Geological Survey and Mines Bureau likewise lacks revenue drive. Even when attempting to raise funds, there appears little desire to collect. When someone tries to move a bit of sand or gravel legitimately, the sand lorry operator—depending on sand for a living—faces obstacles…