The Hon. Bimal Rathnayake

¶ 01 Hon. Speaker, that is entirely false. Those are baseless allegations by a trade union acting on political motivations.

¶ 02 Regarding the straddle carriers—these are specialized cranes used to transport containers unloaded from ships—there was a major fraud associated with their procurement. I have already stated this to this House. Because of the fraud in procuring those straddle carriers, a court case was filed, and as a result we could not bring in 15 of them. Moreover, while the whole world is moving from diesel to electronic/electric equipment, we had procured diesel units.

¶ 03 A Cabinet Paper was submitted in August 2024 to stop that tender. Then, in early September 2024—around the 8th or 9th—the then President Ranil Wickremesinghe and the former Cabinet decided to proceed again. On 9 September it was approved; on 18 September the Port Board resolved to award the tender; on 19 September the agreements were signed; and on 21 September there was a Presidential Election. The value of this deal was USD 18 million. We will definitely take everyone involved before the courts. On the advice of the Attorney General, we cancelled that tender and obtained fresh Cabinet approval to procure new straddle carriers; tenders are now being called. It has been over four months since we took that Cabinet decision.

¶ 04 Hon. Speaker, let me explain further. For cranes, straddle carriers, tugboats, etc., we cannot just pick them off the market. They are built to order after we place orders. That is the reality. The Rajapaksas and Wickremesinghe, and those now trying to prop up a government with Wickremesinghe, have committed economic crimes related to the Ports—national economic crimes.

¶ 05 The East Terminal of Colombo Port should have commenced in 2023. We have now started and are working; completion will be around 2027. By then other countries’ ports will also have advanced. I say these things because they are being twisted otherwise. The lieutenants of those economic assassins are today defending those thieves through media talks. Therefore, we are acting with utmost diligence. We have not recruited new port workers; the existing staff are doing the work. There are shortcomings among them; but there is nothing special about people we newly recruited—there were none. We will intervene to resolve the issues as best as possible.

¶ 06 Thank you very much.