The Hon. (Dr.) Nalinda Jayatissa - Minister of Health and Media

Jathika Jana balawegaya· Kalutara· 1 March 2025 ·Debate: Debate: Fuel Supply and Energy Crisis (Discussion under Standing Order 27(2))

Cost of Living

AI summary generated by gpt-5.5

The Minister stated that fuel queues had appeared in some locations due to panic-buying following misinformation about distribution problems, but said there was no fuel shortage. He reported that 19 million litres had been ordered, dealers were ordering above usual levels, and the CPC was continuing distribution. He said fuel orders would be accepted throughout the day, and possibly on Sunday if necessary, and urged the public and sectors such as tourism not to queue or over-purchase.

Verbatim record (translated)

Machine-translated from Sinhala / Tamil / English

¶ 01 Mr. Speaker, before my statement, I will very briefly respond. We acknowledge there were queues yesterday at some locations. Thank you to the Opposition for highlighting it; we too made statements. When wrong messages spread—suggesting distribution problems—people panic-buy. Currently, 19 million litres have been ordered. Dealers have ordered more than usual. Normally, orders after 7.00 a.m. are not accepted; today, as a response to the situation, we accept orders throughout the day, and after assessing by evening, if needed we will accept orders on Sunday as well, though we normally do not.

¶ 02 There is no fuel shortage. There is no need for people to fill extra in panic. Dealers are placing orders; CPC is distributing. Especially those in tourism and other sectors should remain calm. Only a very limited number of dealers are engaging in the said actions; others are ordering and distributing. Therefore, people can refuel without queueing.

Provenance

Source: Hansard, Saturday, 1 March 2025 ·No. 1741955797040395 ·English daily/uncorrected Hansard
Page · column: not yet extracted — page/column anchors are not in the current dataset; the source PDF is the citable location.
Permalink: /lk/speeches/256

View source PDF ↗ Suggest a correction

Cite as: The Hon. (Dr.) Nalinda Jayatissa - Minister of Health and Media. 10th Parliament, Parliament of Sri Lanka. Hansard, 1 March 2025. No. 1741955797040395. Politick, https://staging.politick.io/lk/speeches/256