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By Ravi Ladduwahetty

The new Welfare Benefit Law under the Government's ambitious financial sector reforms program will ensure that subsidies are allocated only to the deserving poor who number 9.5 million countrywide families. This innovative piece of legislation will empower the authorities to nab confident tricksters who receive these benefits fraudulently.

The Government allocation for the year 2003 has been only Rs. 9.5 billion in contrast to the PA which allocated Rs. 19 billion. The allocations which have been made are: Samurdhi- Rs. 10 billion, Social Services Ministry - Rs. 4 billion, dry nations for refugees- Rs. 2 billion school uniforms- Rs. 800 million.

The scheme will now disburse funds to the real poor and the socially deprived such as the elderly who have no means of support, one parent families,

There has been corruption in the allocation of these subsidies at a macro-level due to the massive politicisation of the system where the deserving poor have been overlooked but the recipients have been those who have had political patronage, Samurdhi Minister R.A.D. Sirisena charged in an interview with the Daily News yesterday.

The Government has commenced an investigation on who the real poor are and so that the benefits could be given only to them. This will mean that the disbursement of the funds will be free of politicisation, he said.

The Minister also said that 12 percent of the present recipients were state sector employees while a further 14 per cent of them were private sector employees. This is outrageous in the light of the deserving poor being genuinely overlooked due to politically motivated corruption, he said.

Quoting an example, he said that there was an applicant for a gun licence in the Galle Divisional Secretariat and he was a proprietory planter. Subsequent investigations revealed that he was also getting Samurdhi benefits.

The Government's allocation for the Samurdhi program for the year 2003 has been only Rs. 9.5 billion, which Minister Sirisena claimed was sufficient to target the real poor, in contrast to the previous regime which allocated up to Rs. 19 billion. This is because the system was rigged with corruption.

The new law also is empowered to bring confident tricksters to book. They will have a one year prison term or a fine of Rs. 5000 or both in the event of providing fraudulent information.

The funds for these welfare measures will be regulated through the Finance Ministry and there will be four Commissioners who will be appointed to administer the funds and their operational mechanism. However, the appointment of the commissioners will have to be made through the Constitutional Council, he said.

The process will be streamlined where all the operations will be brought in under one umbrella and this will mean that the allocations will be done through one institution. Earlier, the National Housing Development Authority was buying tiles, some other Government organisation some other materials and there was no coordination, he said.

Explaining tbe operations of the Samurdhi movement, the Minister said that the deposits of the Samurdhi bank aggregated to Rs. 44 billion in both compulsory and voluntary savings and this was a clear message to the state and private sector commercial banks who treat these poor customers with contempt when they require loans for their self- employment projects.

Commenting on the progress of the welfare schemes initiated by the Government, he said that there were small scale self employment schemes which today have over 60,000 cottage and domestically made products. There were also over 300 weekend village fairs ( Polas) where the rural folks have been facilitated with a marketing network for their products and agricultural produce.

Commenting on the success stories, he said that there was a recipient who procured loan funding for a lobster processing venture who has earned a fortune. This is a real rags to riches story, he said. The Samurdhi program's lottery builds 1200 houses monthly and these are also sold at Rs, 150,000 each.

The Minister assured that the new system will usher in an era where the socially and the politically deprived will be uplifted in a scheme that is devoid of manipulation and corruption.

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