Feb 6 (IL) Cabinet Spokesman and Minister Prof. G.L. Peiris yesterday declared that if the country’s leadership failed to resolve their differences within the next three months and failed to resume peace talks soon Sri Lanka will lose the Rs. four billion as aid pledged at the Tokyo aid summit last year.
Speaking at Madiwela in the Maharagama during the opening of a cultural centre, the Minister said that Sri Lanka was provided with a unique opportunity to emancipate itself from the clutches of poverty and underdevelopment with the allocation of Rs. 450,000 million at the Tokyo summit.
However consequent to the events of November 4, the peace process has got stalled and as a result the funds have been temporarily withheld, the Minister said. Attributing that if the country loses this aid, then it is the common man who would be called upon as usual top pay for such omissions and commission of its leadership.
Prof. Peiris also said at a time when virtually everybody was paying lip service to political cohabitation and the banishment of confrontational politics, Maharagama has blazed forth a trail for the whole country, with politicians belonging to rival parties coming forward to work together for the common good of the people.
