9 October, 2024

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Is The Central Bank On Its Way To Technical Insolvency?

By W A Wijewardena –

Dr. W.A Wijewardena

Stability of Central Bank in Volume II

The Central Bank has issued its Annual Report for 2022 in two volumes, the first on the state of the economy and the second on its operations. The members of the public normally focus on the first volume since it is a rich source of the current and emerging economic situation. A scanty attention is paid to volume number two which brings out the financial position of the Bank. However, it is the volume which should be read and debated by the public because it gives clues about the stability of the Central Bank.

Thumping losses in CB in 2022

According to the financial results released, the Central Bank has made a thumping loss of Rs. 374 billion in 2022 as against a profit of Rs. 158 billion made in 2021. This is by calculating profits or losses in terms of the international accounting standards which the bank is following as its accounting and auditing template. These standards require the Central Bank to recognise the losses arising from the revaluation of foreign assets and liabilities due to exchange rate depreciation as a loss of income in the current year. But the normal central bank account systems require the bank to transfer such losses to a special account called the International Reserve Revaluation Account or IRRA and separate them from the distributable profits or losses. This is how the profit calculation should be made as prescribed in the Monetary Law Act or MLA.

But when this practice is followed by taking out the current revaluation losses amounting to some Rs. 610 billion, the loss of Rs. 374 billion in terms of the International Accounting Standards is converted to a profit of Rs. 235 billion that can be distributed by the bank it wishes to do so. However, as a prudential measure, the bank has decided not to make any profit transfer to the Government out of its financial operations in 2022.

Current CB management is not responsible for the losses

It should be noted that the present management of the Central Bank is not responsible for this malaise. In fact, it is a victim of the imprudent operations conducted by the Central Bank management in the past. Two of such imprudent measures included losing foreign reserves from around $ 7.6 billion at end 2019 to near zero level by March 2022 to keep the exchange rate at an artificial level of Rs. 200 per dollar and increasing the bank’s foreign liabilities to a level of $ 6 billion by that date. Hence, when the assets and liabilities were reassessed by using a collapsed exchange rate of Rs. 363 per US dollar, it resulted in a thumping loss of Rs. 610 billion as reported. This was much more than the generation of rupee profits by the bank during 2022 by lending to the Government at high interest rates of about 30%.

CB’s goal should not be making profits, but it should not make losses either

Profit making is not the goal of a central bank because it can make profits, unlike other entities in an economy, by printing money at its discretion and acquiring assets. If it prints more money, it can make a bigger quantum of profits. But those profits are made at the expense of those who hold on to the money it prints. When the money supply is more than the needs of the economy to conduct its economic transactions, the excess money creating an unwarranted total demand, known as the aggregate demand, for goods and services will lead to an increase in the general price level, on one side, and the depreciation of the exchange rate, on the other. When the general price level increases continuously over a period, it is called inflation.

Both inflation and the exchange rate depreciation will reduce the real value of the money held by people. For instance, if one goes by the underestimated Colombo Consumers’ Price Index, or CCPI, which is used as the country’s official measure of cost of living, a rupee earned in January 2021 is now worth only about 50 cents. Similarly, a person who has earned an income of Rs. 200 in January 2021 would have been able to command a basket of goods worth of one US dollar. The same one hundred rupees can command only a basket worth of 55 US cents in December 2022. Hence, the public is hit twice by the unnecessary money increases by a central bank, though it makes profits for it, leading to inflation and currency depreciation. This is not the goal of a central bank and therefore, it is not expected to make profits at the risk of generating inflation and currency depreciation.

Losses not tolerated in CBs

But a central bank is not expected to make losses either. Those losses will reduce its capital base and when the capital falls to a critically low level of making its monetary obligations in the form of currency it has issued and demand deposits it is holding more than the capital, it is reduced to a venture with a negative net worth. In the case of a private business, a venture with a negative net worth is not a ‘going concern’ meaning it cannot do its business, and, hence, should be compulsorily wound up. A central bank cannot be wound up like that and, therefore, should be given new capital by the taxpayers. This is a situation that should be avoided.

When the Central Bank continued to make losses in 2013, 2014, and 2015 causing a depletion of its capital base, I warned the Central Bank in this series that it should take action to reverse the trend to avoid the state of a negative net worth in the Bank. In the subsequent years, the Bank was able to reverse the trend and avoid the obvious pitfall.

CBs can make profits in forex operations

However, there is no objection to a central bank making modest profits in its foreign exchange operations after ensuring the safety of its foreign investments. This is because the foreign exchange operations are done by a central bank as the agent of the government by managing the nation’s foreign reserves. What is earned through these operations is earned from the rest of the world and has no implications for the domestic aggregate demand and consequential inflation and currency depreciation. Since foreign reserves are there to meet a foreign currency shortfall and avoid payment difficulties, it is not expected to take high risks by engaging in speculative types of investment.

In the past, there have been occasions where the Central Bank has violated this golden principle. As a result, in the new central bank bill, it has been stipulated that the central bank should conduct its foreign exchange operations ‘having regard to safety, liquidity, and return in that order of priority’. Therefore, even in the case of foreign exchange operations, the priority is not making profits but ensuring safety first, and liquidity second. Hence, the central bank should look at the return in investments only after the first two have been satisfied.

Capital ratios are a protective measure in CBs

Unlike currency boards where every currency note issued should be backed by an equal value of foreign reserves, central banks are not required to maintain such a reserve backing. Hence, capital becomes important for central banks. To force central banks to maintain adequate capital funds relative to the assets they create, the laws governing them have provided for maintaining proper capital ratios. For instance, the Monetary Law Act which governs the present central bank has required the Monetary Board of the Central Bank to build up capital funds equal to at least 15% of its domestic assets defined as the difference between the total assets and foreign assets.

Monetary liabilities of a CB

By acquiring assets, both domestic and foreign, a central bank creates monetary liabilities known as reserve money or monetary base. They are of two types, currency which is a sight liability – because a central bank is required to pay value on sight – and demand deposits held for commercial banks and other institutions which are demand liabilities – because the bank is required to pay its value on demand. When the assets go up, these liabilities also go up. But in the case of foreign assets, there is protection because the central bank has a claim on a foreigner who is required to pay value in foreign currencies. Therefore, the risks arise from two sides. One is the loss of the foreign reserves by wasting them unnecessarily to protect the exchange rate or to make payments which are not of any benefit to the country.

But it leads to the reduction in the monetary liabilities or the reserve money creating a liquidity shortage in the system. To overcome this, the bank will have to create new reserve money by creating domestic assets. To restrain the bank from doing this extravagantly, the MLA has tied the creation of domestic assets to the capital funds of the bank. The prescribed 15% is the minimum and it should strive to maintain a high and a safe ratio.

Maintaining a 100% capital ratio under CB modernisation project

Under the Central Bank Modernisation Project which was in operation during 2000-4, the Bank had agreed with the funding agency, the World Bank, that it would bring the ratio gradually to 100% over time. This was a protective measure introduced by the World Bank to see that the money lent to the central bank will be used properly. It required the central bank to refrain itself from making annual profit transfers or if it is done, to keep it at a low level and transfer the entire surplus to the capital funds. As the figure shows, the central bank was able to attain this goal by building the capital funds from 25% of the domestic assets to 97% by 2007. However, as the figure shows, in the subsequent years, this goal was abandoned by the central bank and as a result, it fell below even the 15% in 2015. The advantage of maintaining up to 100% of domestic assets as capital funds is converting the operation of the central bank to a virtual currency board. Accordingly, a part of the reserve money is covered by foreign assets and the rest by capital funds.

Depletion of capital ratio to 2% in 2022

The thumping losses made by the central bank in 2022 causing the depletion of the capital funds to a bare minimum level has reduced the ratio from 20% in 2021 to 2% in 2022. But as the graph shows, it is a deterioration started a few years back. In 2019, the ratio was 52%. But since the central bank transferred the entirety of its profits to the government in 2020 and 2021 without concern for the need of building capital funds, on one side, and the increase of domestic assets dramatically, the ratio began to fall. Strangely, the Monetary Board at that time did not think it necessary to protect the solvency of the bank.

New central bank bill has diluted CB’s capital requirement

In the proposed new central bank bill, the procedure of protecting the capital adequacy of the bank has been changed from 15% of domestic assets to 6% of monetary liabilities which are called reserve money or the monetary base. In the existing MLA, it is related to the monetary base via the domestic assets, the source of the creation of such base. This has been avoided in the new bill by directly connecting it to the base. What this means is that a minimum of 6% of the monetary base is covered by capital funds. This is a too low protection, and it would have been better had it remained at the original level of 15% prescribed in the MLA.

Present capital level is even below the diluted ratio of new central bank bill

The currently depleted capital base of Rs. 82 billion is just 6% of the monetary base of Rs. 1,349 billion as at the end of 2022. But since then, the monetary base has expanded to Rs. 1,643 billion by end April 2023 causing the ratio to fall to 5%, below the minimum level prescribed in the new central bank bill. This presents a high solvency risk for the Central Bank and the Monetary Board under MLA or its successor, the Governing Board, under the new central bank act should not take it lightly. It may require the Central Bank to go for austerity measures just like it has recommended to the rest of the nation under the current readjustment program with IMF.

Since the bank is not able to create domestic assets under the IMF program and even the existing interest earning investments in Treasury bills amounting to Rs. 2.8 trillion are to be converted to a negotiable 10-year bond under the new central bank act as a part of the domestic debt restructuring, its income base in the next 5 years will be drastically reduced. The bank has a committed expenditure of Rs. 10 billion as personnel expenses and another Rs. 2 billion as other expenses, it will face a serious solvency problem in the next few years.

CB is not insolvent as yet, but may be if prudent policies are not adopted

As it is the Central Bank is not insolvent. But it may if it does not adopt a suitable strategy to cut its expenses and keep its books balanced in the next few years. This is a malaise which the Monetary Board should avoid.

*The writer, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, can be reached at waw1949@gmail.com

Latest comments

  • 8
    0

    We have heard that during Rajapaksa time creative accounting was carried out at the CB. Has the CB corrected these and is it one of the reason for the loss? I think the author was one of the officers at the CB at that time. Remember CB paying for Namal- Cabraal train dance at a party in the US funded by the CB?

    • 2
      4

      Dear Buddhist01,
      .
      Dr Wijewardena tries to be non-controversial is the feeling that I have. I have know him since March 2018 when he looked me up in Maharagama and gave me many books. As his email address indicates, he is a few months younger than me. About the same age as our much derided President.
      .
      Dr Wijewardena has given us his email address. Why not address your queries direct to Dr Wijewardena?
      .
      Don’t you think that nobody doing that is a major reason why we never seem to get anywhere with our discussions. I realise the problem for you you if you do write to him. You give away your identity.
      .
      Let me see if you take me up on that suggestion.
      .
      Best wishes,
      .
      Panini Edirisinhe (NIC 483111444V)

      • 3
        1

        Hi Sinhala Man,

        Thank you for your comment. If SL is a country where the rule of law is applied by the Police and the Judiciary I would definitely write to the Dr. Unfortunately we all know that is not the case. In such circumstances, I would like to use this forum to share my views on many matters. My acceptance of my views as right or wrong will depend on my evaluation of the comments I read written by others. There have been instances based on the response to my views written by other readers have enabled me to see another side to the ideas I have.

        Once again thank you for your comment.

        • 0
          0

          Dear Buddhist1,
          .
          I appreciate the truth of what you say.
          .
          It’s quite amazing how we’re still surviving in Sri Lanka. I want this message to get through to all honest readers, starting with you.
          .
          I hope that by refusing to refer to the commenters who are a nuisance to us, that what I now say will be allowed to stand. Let us focus on communicating with those who have the intelligence to read between the lines, and value what honest people like us are saying.
          .
          Panini Edirisinhe

      • 3
        0

        SM
        .
        Who cares about the books or other gifts you have been given? , how many days he is older or younger than you, etc., but what matters is the retelling and doing of the highly controversial bond scam. It is important to us but his personal details, what he wears, how many children and grandchildren he has etc. are not of concern to CT readers.
        How did you, so called former teacher, ever answer your papers if you don’t know the basics to focus on the main topic?
        .
        This Wijewardena was an insider in the Central Bank of Sri Lanka when Medamulana Burua was the Finance Minister. Sorisena made it clear, the BOND scam seeds were planted by them during that time.
        As is the case in a cabin crew, filled with all flight attendents and other officers should be aware of anything and everything regarding their areas, those who worked in executive position in CB, should be well aware of the facts regarding SO CALLED BOND SCAM which was planted by JVPrs to take the revenge on UNP. JVP and UNP are arch rivals going back that 89 inusrgency.
        .

      • 0
        0

        SM,
        .
        Your comments are today like ” water of a duck’s back ” to many in CT.
        :
        When would you learn something ?
        .
        Get well !
        .
        LM

  • 6
    2

    The main reform to the central bank should be to make it independent of the government.

  • 5
    1

    The rule book was thrown out of the window when MR took power. Maybe it was ignorance, incompetence or corruption (most likely all of that) when MR & his cronies rewrote the rules according to their whims & fancies but even mistakes cannot be tolerated when the entire country is at stake. Mahendran abused his power with his influencing, which can be described as insider trading that primarily benefitted his family & Cabral is responsible for the disastrous hedging deals. Investing in Greek bonds at a time when Greece was in financial dire straits was utter stupidity but even mistakes cannot be tolerated or excused & heads should roll.

    The current lot of politicians, including the JVP, have benefitted, & have soiled hands, therefore, unlikely that any of those responsible will be punished as it would be opening a can of worms. We need people with integrity from the civil society, such as, Naganada Kodithuwakku, who has been a sole crusader in the fight against unfair perks of politicians, to take over & set the country on a straight path.

    • 4
      0

      This comment was removed by a moderator because it didn’t abide by our Comment policy.

      For more detail see our Comment policy https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/comments-policy-2

    • 1
      1

      Dear Raj-UK,
      .
      I was rather surprised
      to see my earlier comment addressed to you edited out. I agree absolutely that although the entire period of seventy-five years since Independence has been a sad one, it is after this particular Rajapaksa Family took over that things began to get really bad.
      .
      We continue to survive, but only just. See how complicated all this has become. MR won the Presidency in 2005 by defeating Ranil Wickremasinghe. It is now generally granted that Ranil would have won that election had Prabhakaran and the LTTE not ordered the population of the Northern Province to stay at home. I was in Sri Lanka at that time, and I’m sure that I would have voted at that election.
      .
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Sri_Lankan_presidential_election
      .
      Now even I’m beginning to be unsure how I would have voted. I knew the system allowed three preferences, and I have usually tried to make them all count by giving my first two preferences to “worthwhile” minor candidates, but casting the last preference so as to eliminate the undesirable major candidate.
      .
      What a mess; but let it be for now!

    • 1
      1

      2/many
      .
      I’m trying now to work out
      what the JVP would have been in 2005. They were people whom we shunned. The leader would have been this man:
      .
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somawansa_Amarasinghe
      .
      Where would AKD have been? He’s been a Member of Parliament since 2004, but I have no clear memory of him:
      .
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anura_Kumara_Dissanayaka
      .
      Wikipedia says that he was made the leader of the JVP only on 2 February 2014. I’ve told you that I’ve been listening to all those speeches by him, and I’m now satisfied that this is the Group I’d like to see victorious at any election. I feel that I have a clear idea now of who AKD is, and quite a contrast to Ranil. I know that I quite enthusiastically supported JR Jayawardena in 1977, and soon after that election I remember Ranil got admired as the nephew. I’m not sure I knew him straight away, he must have grown in my mind as a guy was going to last long.
      .
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranil_Wickremesinghe
      .
      I’m trying to piece together when I became conscious of Ranil being the actual Minister of Education. According to Wikipedia, above, that has been on on 14 February 1980.

    • 1
      1

      3/many
      .
      I’d been an employee
      in the Ministry of Education since 3/7/1968, but I wouldn’t have been conscious of Ranil in 1980. This despite my sister, two years younger than me, having been in the Law Faculty just a year junior to Ranil. I knew that by the time my sister graduated and was taken on as a Temporary Assistant Lecturer for a year, G.L. Peiris was the Professor.
      .
      I have met Ranil once – he wouldn’t remember it, at STC, Bandarawela in 2017. But G.L. Peiris and I now actually know each other, without actually exchanging greetings every time. I think that I have now persuaded myself that I, and my classmates at Mt Lavinia, had heard of his being driven to school in his Austin Princess. I feel that those memories grow on us.
      .
      So, I think that AKD as a politician has grown on me from the time that I first began to notice him on TV. He used to stun us all with his memory, rattling off statistics with seeming effortlessness. I remember landmarks in my own life, but public figures tend to grow in our minds.

    • 1
      1

      4/many

      .
      Time flies.
      I saw this a few hours ago. Are you conscious of these Local Government Elections in the UK? You ought to be, and by the time you see my comments (if they appear at all), you’d have got the results.
      .
      https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/uk-pm-sunak-looks-limit-losses-first-major-electoral-test-2023-05-03/
      .
      Startlingly similar to the Elections that we ought to have had here eight weeks ago:
      .
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Sri_Lankan_local_elections
      .
      So, we become unsure about events that were keenly anticipated. This appears to be the conscious strategy being followed by Ranil.
      .
      I’m hoping that these comments get displayed today, before those UK Election Results start coming in. I thought I knew something of the process that you have there. There would surely be no question of some fellow seizing power in the arbitrary way that we have seen Ranil grabbing it here. And here we have people pontificating on how “we” (just individuals!) must not have elections because the country is not ready for them!

  • 4
    0

    Looks like they are still into the futuristic speculative schemes with the essential country-stabilizing reserve currency….the money that should kept safe for emergency measures when the country starts starving, which it is right now – starving. All kinds of vast experimentation with peoples money on what the Rajapaksas started is STILL being undertaken – BRICS, Greek bonds,Russian Rubles, Crypto, with the huge gambling risk that Russia will win the war. And IMF loans are not going to be used to uplift the people. No, they are to be used for the ultimate in AI in 2048.

    • 5
      0

      RTF,
      I raise again why our Sri Lankan Americans do not care about the ill-gotten wealth of “medamulana rascal brothers and sisters” in America. Biased media mislead the masses with their misconceptions, but we know from our reports that they are not “Walawwa people”.
      Shortly before the 2005 election, it was revealed that Mahinda Rajapaksa also living a low quality life.There are enough videos to prove the truths and factful details.
      .
      That gold business queen was no different from the fishmonger of that era. she is not eduated either.. Today, however, the blood they have been sucking for decades has made them rich, but has grabbed the last cent of the poor.
      .
      When the reality is this, why on earth can’t we sue our own people today? They do not have the wealth of Germany and France. Today, even if our parents are raped and killed, our people do not care. Wherever we are, that is the nature of our Sinhalese. We want to jail up Rajapaksa everywhere. Now Punnaku-drinking villagers are again paving the way to mobilize for their next comeback against BP.

      • 3
        0

        Yes, within the last 10 years, when you calculate all forex coming to Sri Lanka- ME maids, tourism, tea, rubber, apparel, fish, produce, gems,….we should have been worth 100-billion USD, minus 30-billion for imports = $70 billion USD. How hard our people have worked and struggled for it all to have disappeared.

        • 2
          0

          RTF,
          .
          Thank you, but that doesn’t answer my question raised above. What do you (as SL american) think is behind those complacent Sri Lankan Americans who are yet indifferent over the accumulated wealth of Basil and his sisters in the United States?

          There are lawyers, professors in humanity studies, antropologists and the like and the like individuals among them, why not they act yet regarding this alarming issues ?

          In some european countries, it is impossible expats to gather that much of wealth, without the knowledge of local finance authorities. In Germany for example, they lock up soccer league leaders putting them in jail for a few years. That is inevitable by laws prevalent in this part of the world.
          They earn a greater respect in their regions to the manner some artists and religioius degnitaries are held above the altar in india.As you know some league leaders are held like gods in Germany and several other EU countries.
          .
          Nevertheless, law and order is given in Germany and other european countries its due place. So is the situation also in Singapore, even if our media prostitutes think that Arjuna Mahendran can still be charged for ” mahabanku horakama – so called bond scam”.

        • 2
          0

          RTF,
          .
          Thank you, but That does not answer my question, raised above, what do you think is behind those srilankaen americans that give a damn regarding the collected wealth of Basil and his sisters in the US ?
          :
          How can they allow a poor nation be looted to the core in the making their wealths ? If there are law provisions that could serve the justice for our people, why not SRIANKEN americans act accordingly ? If not today when ?

          • 4
            0

            Leelagemalli,

            It has been reported in the press that many Lankan Americans are very much against the Rajapaksas, and in fact many support the socialist groups. But yes, there are a number who support the R’s. Some come here straight from SL with plenty of money and invest in prime real estate and the American business venture. Some send their children to study here with payoffs from the R’s Many more will come that way for their support of them in any upcoming elections. I have mentioned all of this before.
            But yes, our Lankan Americans must do everything to bring the R”s to justice. Trouble is, all these people connected to the R’s and also previous regime payoffs are just ordinary folk, and none wants to rock the diasporic boat (non Tamil i.e.). It’s American authorities that must investigate these travesties. No, but they are busy filling their coffers with ill-begotten wealth from poor countries such as ours.

            • 4
              0

              And R’s and co. are pretending they have a vast stash of money to the tune of about $70 billion stashed in overseas alternate investment accounts that will soon come to maturity, and then Sri Lanka will boom with prosperity. That’s why some are lining up to vote for them. In truth, all that money has vanished into the Ukraine war.

              • 2
                0

                Dear Ramona,
                .
                Thank you
                for all the honest things that you’re saying from America. You show real concern for the people here.
                .
                I’m hoping that by my desisting totally from criticizing others (who are clearly trying to provoke me) the comments that I now make will be allowed to stand.
                .
                The Red and Green Thumbs also appear to act in funny ways. But having written that sentence, I’ve given you a Green Approval because I know from experience that you may not be sure whether your comment has been seen by others or not.
                .
                We never liked the Rajapaksas, but our primary foe at this time is Ranil Wickremasinghe. I don’t think that the guy is in Sri Lanka at this moment. He’s trying to attend this:
                .
                https://www.bbc.com/news/world-65426265
                .
                Because that story carries a number I hope that it will always bring up that particular story, and not just the BBC Website.
                .
                Panini Edirisinhe from Bandarawela

            • 1
              0

              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liuHf9N0IFU

              The truth is that MaRa never came to earn that great wealth. How can accusers and others be blessed with unestimable wealth?

              Socery have made the people fooler than any times before, but deliberately for their survival. He never thought, that the same nation cant be fooled forever. Today people hate him today like pest. … but I dont trust our people easily.

              • 1
                0

                The point leelagemalli, is that the Ranilian regime is no better than the Rajapaksa regime. Only difference is Rajapaksas are goday (and therefore look very evil). Ranil on the other hand acts with Western sophistication and so people like the Colomboites feel that Western sophistication erases all evil.

                Ranil is doing the exact same thing but in a more formal way with visits to British Royal coronations and funerals. He is taking the base reserve money of the hardworking-long suffering-starving-Lankan-Masses and gamboling with it on international markets! difference is with the MaRa crowd is that MaRa crowd clandestinely killed off dissidents. Ranil is very confidently and legitimately torturing and killing suffering dissidents who have to pay sky-high taxes to work the domestic program, with the blessings of the British Crown.

  • 1
    0

    another major reform we should do to our central bank is to see that it cannot print money.Sri lanka and singapore went in opposite directions when the singapore centralbank was set up in 1971 it was constitutionally made to not print any money whreas we printed ,printed and printed everytime we needed money without trying to eradicate the underlying causes of innefficiencies.

  • 1
    0

    Dear Buddhist1, Raj-UK, and RTF,
    .
    Comment updates haven’t come in yet, but I’ve been looking at news from England, and see that the reasons I conjectured about Ranil going to London are justified.
    .
    He will come back and make claims which some of my village neighbours will believe.
    .
    https://www.adaderana.lk/news/90320/president-attends-commonwealth-summit-in-london-
    .
    I feel that Ranil won’t actually meet King Charles on this visit. He has met the Rwandan President. Ranil must have met Charles on September 20, 2022.
    .
    https://www.dailymirror.lk/breaking_news/Thousands-gather-in-London-for-King-Charles-IIIs-Coronation/108-258723
    .
    In any case, the Coronation hasn’t been all that popular:
    .
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/may/06/head-of-uks-leading-anti-monarchy-group-arrested-at-coronation-protest
    .
    No talk of confiscating all the property of protestors.
    .
    Local Government Elections have gone against Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives, but that won’t affect his majority in Parliament. His Party had received a landslide victory in December 2019, and has a comfortable majority until next year. No question of crossovers. If I’m shown to have significantly distorted, I shall apologise.
    .
    Panini Edirisinhe

    • 0
      0

      Here’s a challenge for the handful of persons who often rise to Ranil’s defence:
      .
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Er650Yt33g0
      .
      That’s the fullest possible coverage of the Coronation by CNN, still continuing. It’s over 9 hours already – CNN has understood that some people desire this stuff!
      .
      Please try to spot Ranil Wickremasinghe in all this, and tell us at what point you’ve seen him. I will not undertake it myself.
      .
      Or locate him elsewhere!
      .
      https://www.newsfirst.lk/2023/05/06/president-first-lady-congratulate-king-charles-iii/
      .
      Admittedly the above says that they met. However, I have my doubts about it. Could it have been in September 2022, when Ranil went up for the Queen’s funeral?
      .
      If I’m wrong, please tell me.
      .
      Panini Edirisinhe of Bandarawela (NIC 3111444V)

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