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Cost of living and peace, priorities for new government

By the Daily News Elections Desk

A wide ranging cross-section of people interviewed by the Daily News expressed hope that the new government elected by the people would address key issues of cost of living and establishing peace, as priorities in its program of action.

University Lecturer L. Ian said that what he expected from a new Government was long term stability and measures to bring down the cost of living.

Mr. Ian said that putting in place the mechanisms and activating them to root out corruption to check abuse and misuse of power should be another priority of the new Government irrespective of which party or parties were represented.

Quintus De Silva, a leading businessman of Moratuwa expressed similar sentiments and noted that immediate measures should be taken to bring down the cost of living.

"There should also be fairplay sans political or other interference and the commitment to do a good job of work to ensure a fair deal for the people of this country," he said.

A graduate teacher for over 30 years and a father of two adolescents A. Amarasinghe said that he expects the new government would pay more attention to the problems of the middle class.

He said despite several pay hikes the sky rocketing cost of living, the middle class was still having a hard time trying to make ends meet.

He was very much hopeful that the new government will make an concerted effort to lessen the large gap between private sector and public sector salary scales. Sunethra Siriwardena, a working mother in the banking sector and a mother of a young daughter said that all parties must put an end to their fights squabbling over petty individual interests and join hands in a dedicated effort at nation building.

Rivalry between political parties and the creation of fractions among the main ethnic group will only lead to victory for 'Prabhakaran,' she said.

"The country has seen enough violence in the north, south and the east alike. People have voiced their concerns repeatedly and shown how much they were willing to sacrifice to see an end to the war in the North and East.

K. D. Dharamasena (42), a three wheel taxi driver from Maradana:

"We would expect the new government to ensure that violence and crime in the country is reduced. As people who move about at different hours of the day we are aware that there is much underworld activity especially in some sections of Colombo and its suburbs.

Most people fear to go to such areas and even we are cautious to drive into such areas when someone engages us on a hire.

Michael Fonseka (46), a hardware store owner, Wattala said the new government should make the public service a more efficient one.

"It is very difficult to get anything done in most of the government offices today. Very often public servants do not discharge their duties as they should. I think this attitude is inherited. It stems from a number of root causes.

"What I feel is that the new government should introduce a scheme to bring efficiency to the public service so that people are not kept waiting to get various matters attended to promptly. At present there doesn't seem to be any motivation for this."

R. Udayanath (31) a small businessman of Colombo 15, said the new government should work to achieve peace in the country. It should make all efforts to end the war in the North and East so that the country could be developed. Trade and commerce are affected by the war. There should be a free flow of trade between the South and the North so that both sides are benefitted.

A leading businessman in the Pettah Manning Market, Ruwan Nayanajith is on the view that whoever forms a new Government must take new measures to keep the price of diesel at a fixed rate and ensure that people engaged in the vegetable as well as the fishing industry are given relief.

The prices of vegetable and fish in the Pettah market very often go up due to high cost charged by transporters."

Mrs. W. Kusumawathi, of Kottawa a mother of three children said that the prices of infant and other varieties of milk foods are increased by companies very often even without the knowledge of the Government.

Stern action must be brought to bear on this activity by Government even to the extent of imposing price control on milk foods."

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Copyright 2001 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd.
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