The Hon. Kabir Hashim

¶ 01 If you do not understand, please take your seat. [Interruption.]

¶ 02 As of yesterday, at least use that rice import tax revenue to pay for fertilizer, or compensate farmers at Rs. 40,000 for crop losses. That too has not happened. Are you Marxists or neoliberals? We cannot even tell.

¶ 03 Next, the financial sector. Anura Kumara Dissanayake and the JVP opposed debt restructuring, calling much of it “odious debt.” Globally, leftist economists hold that such debt need not be repaid, should be haircutted heavily. You said the same. Let me cite Ecuador in 2008. President Rafael Correa appointed a Public Debt Audit Commission to examine 30 years of debt—whether loans were illegally given, for private gain, etc. Following the audit, part of the debt was cut. You pledged similar action. Why has it not been done? The JVP Government lacked the confidence to even evaluate or discuss debt restructuring. System change means: a small group—political powerbrokers, business magnates, corporate heads, bank heads and their private ties—must not be allowed to block progressive policies. You must change them. You were given power to do that, but in these 100 days, you failed. In domestic debt restructuring, you hit the EPF and ETF; we opposed burdening workers’ funds.