The Hon. Namal Rajapaksa, Attorney-at-Law

¶ 01 Hon. Presiding Member, we welcome the presentation of the NBRI Bill. The institution has existed since 1984; in 2019, Hon. Ranjith Madduma Bandara, as Minister, presented a Cabinet paper, and in 2025 the Bill has come to Parliament. While the world has been debating environmental and geophysical risks, it has taken us decades to legislate; still, better late than never.

¶ 02 But beyond establishing the body, we need a long-term plan, with attention to climate and geostrategic realities. Sri Lanka’s location makes it a maritime and aviation hub; regional environmental changes demand international collaboration by the NBRI.

¶ 03 Your government has been in office a year; it is not productive to keep blaming past governments. Review how many of your promises you have delivered and what benefits have reached the people. Instead, the country is abuzz about how 159 MPs became wealthy within a year.

¶ 04 According to your Department of Census and Statistics, in Q2 this year agriculture fell 3.6 per cent; vegetable output fell 3.6 per cent. You say you give fertilizer and protect farmers, yet you import potatoes during harvest and onions during harvest, devastating farmers’ incomes. Fisheries fell by 34 per cent in Q2, despite your rhetoric about our seas. Rubber declined by 10.7 per cent. These are your statistics.

¶ 05 On the Electricity Act: it is pointless to blame us now. You said you would tear that law apart and even sacrifice your lives; now the greatest pain felt by CEB workers is that they were deceived by such rhetoric. The era of fear-mongering politics is over.

¶ 06 Graduates campaigned door-to-door for you; now, when they protest for jobs, they are assaulted and chased away. Development Officers taught for six years during COVID when teachers could not. Your unions once used children for politics; now you advise unions what to do. If you recognized those officers’ skills and absorbed them, they would not be on the streets.

¶ 07 A year has passed. Look at how daily wage earners live; factories are closing; jobs are being lost. Media are told not to ask tough questions. Bring good Bills like this, but real system change is not arriving in a cab carrying a plantain bunch for party HQ and then riding a Montero; it is resolving the problems of Development Officers, CEB workers, and the working people. Thank you.