The Hon. Wasantha Samarasinghe

¶ 01 Thank you, Hon. Speaker.

¶ 02 I do not know whether the Hon. Sujeewa Senasinghe received the proper time or wandered around during his time. On the opening day, Dr. Lakshman Kiriella and Hon. Kabir Hashim — neither present now — spoke on Government policy and programme to stabilize the economy. They tried to critique our development plans and programme together with this second Budget. Some criticisms had no basis and did not reflect facts. They also spoke about the IMF. I will explain how we modified and are implementing the IMF understandings. They also talked about a US statement asking people not to come to Sri Lanka — that has been corrected. The Opposition’s lamentation continues because they have nothing substantive to say.

¶ 03 Hon. President Anura Dissanayake presented the Budget for 48 hours and 20 minutes as Finance Minister. I invite the Opposition to debate the policy points and proposals therein. Some of their speeches make us laugh. They talk about vehicle sales and fake lists. They claim we only paste posters against corruption. There are even those who wrote books on the bond scam and got exposed themselves. Therefore I will balance this debate.