“To develop Sri Lanka like Singapore, implement policies designed by professionals not politicians”

If Sri Lanka needs to be developed like Singapore, the Government needs to implement policies designed by professionals but not by politicians who are reluctant to take input from professionals, said Asanga Abeyagoonasekera, former Executive Director of the Lakshman Kadirgamar Institute for International Relations and Strategic Studies.

Abeyagoonasekera, son of former Parliamentarian Ossie Abeyagoonasekera who was assassinated in 1994, in an interview with the Daily FT said when a country has weak Government institutions, there would be no development in that country. “Over 80% of our Government institutes are running at a loss. We need to strengthen weak institutes if we have a goal to make the country like Singapore,” he said.

Contesting from the UNP from Gampaha District, Abeyagoonasekera, who is a member of the World Economic Forum, said that he was a strong supporter of the previous Government as an administrative officer who aspired to see a complete eradication of the LTTE terrorism but became a strong opponent when former President Mahinda Rajapaksa moved from the democratic process by implementing the 18th Amendment. 

“The reason that I joined the UNP is that it is the party which talks about good governance and could bring a change. I also think Ranil Wickremesinghe can take the country forward to a closer journey with the world. He promised the people one million jobs and setting up of 45 industrial zones,” he said.

Following are the excerpts of the interview: 

By Shanika Sriyananda

Q: How do you view the country’s present economic situation and what are the future challenges?

A: Sri Lanka’s present per capita income is 3,000 and our target is to reach 20,000 by 2020. For this journey we need to have the right political environment. Each time a government comes into power, there will be policy changes and this is one of the crucial factors that we are confronted with now. We need to have a national policy towards reaching our goals. 

Input from the p eople from the different sectors of the society was not taken in for political policy making. This is another weak area we have. For example when I was at the Lakshman Kadirgamar Institute for International Relations and Strategic Studies (LKIIRSS) we tried to feed political inputs into the system. It failed most of the time because politicians don’t want to take those policy inputs send from research institutes. We need to develop research component. We have 77 research institutes in the country but only 0.05% of GDP is spent for research and development, which is very low compared to the countries which are moving towards developed countries. We need to spend more on research and development.

We need to develop different sectors of society including policy making. Take the Government institutes for example and think, how do you make Government policies towards improving Government institutes? That should be taken by the professionals in the Government institutes. This shouldn’t be designed by politicians. They are there to take in the inputs developed by professionals. If you have weak institutions in any country, there will be no development in that country. Over 80% of our Government institutes are running at a loss. We need to strengthen weak institutes if we have a goal to make the country like Singapore.

Innovation is another area that I see as being very weak in Sri Lanka. We should move towards an innovation-driven economy. We were in a factory-driven economy and slowly shifting towards an efficiency-driven economy with per capita increased, infrastructure development and highways coming up. Now Sri Lanka is categorised as being the early stages of the efficiency-driven economy. What we should look is for an efficiency-driven and innovation-driven economy. Do we have the right institutes and right political culture for that? If we don’t have the competent and right people in Parliament, then there will be a big void. You can’t have 192 people without Advanced Level qualifications. 

We get the story of Singapore all the time. Let’s see Sri Lankans who made Singapore. It’s Foreign Minister Rajaratnam. He, who is highly qualified, is an iconic person. Present Deputy Prime Minister Shanmugaratnam, highly-qualified and very closely associated with the world. Politicians need not only to be qualified, they have to be in the international arena. Sri Lanka has amazing human resources. But unfortunately we have become a low skill production country which produces housemaids and boys for Korean jobs. This should change; why do we want to send young talented youth for low scale jobs? We need to train them and put them into the right fields. There is no innovation in the country and we have failed to produce even a needle of our own. I see these as the future challenges which need to be addressed well to have a sound economy. 

Q: Why did you think to enter into politics? Is it because you come from a family of politics or because you want to contribute 

towards a change?

A: I wanted to enter into politics not because my father and also my grandfather were in politics. He was assassinated in 1994 and I could have joined politics earlier if I wanted to. I worked in Government institutes for over 10 years. My first challenge was to rebuild 12 fisheries harbours in the country after the tsunami, which damaged 10 harbours completely. I was able to rebuild 10 and added some new harbours. When I took over the Fisheries Corporation, it was running at a loss of Rs. 200 million and I took the challenge and made it profitable in three years. Then I joined the Foreign Employment Agency, which was also running at a loss and I was able to make it profitable too. So, I was rebuilding Government institutes and trying to make them efficient. Then I joined the LKIIRSS. 

All these experience working with politicians made me interested in joining politics. Before I had no intention of joining politics but I was invited by former Minister of Defence Ruwan Wijewardene, who is one of my good friends. My father could represent people for only three months as he was assassinated. Politics is the top layer which needs a bit of cleansing. These are the reasons why I thought of contesting. 

We need to do a lot. Sri Lanka is in the 83rd place of the Corruption Perception Index. I think how we can bring this ranking down will be the discussion point. Sri Lankan politicians behave the way they want although we do have a few really good politicians. They make their wives their private secretaries, abuse State properties, etc. Assets of politicians should be looked at from election to election very clearly. We need to see the growth of their assets and there can’t be a very significant growth in their assets. We shouldn’t just declare the asset but need to analyse them. Their assets should be under the microscope. 

Q: Why do you want to contest from the UNP?

A: One reason is that my father contested from the UNP. My grandfather was also the UNP organiser for Kelaniya for 10 years. He did a lot of service to the people and created over 7,000 jobs for people. So it is a family which is more close to the UNP. The second reason is that the UNP is the party which talks about good governance and could bring a change. I also think Ranil Wickremesinghe can take the country forward to a closer journey with the world. He promised the people one million jobs and setting up of 45 industrial zones. 

Q: Soon after this Government came into power you were removed from your post as the Executive Director of the LKIIRSS claiming that you were a political appointee. Your views?

A: Yes, I was removed from the Institute. I have lots of experience with politicians during the last 10 years. Once I was in the Foreign Employment Agency and a politician called and said he wanted all furniture of the agency. He came and removed all. This is the power of the politicians and they do anything that they want. This is a serious weakness of our country. This needs a change. But joining politics I don’t know whether I could bring about 100% change. 

Q: But didn’t you support the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime?

A: Yes, I was supporting the MR Government when I was heading the institute. If you look at the first term till 2009, I really admired that first term because 17 harbour developments came under that time. I really admired him for combating terrorism. I saw him as a leader who was going to eradicate terrorism completely. I did support him fully. When it came to the 18th Amendment I was really opposed it and wrote against it when he tried to extend the term and tried to bring independent commissions including the Bribery Commission under him. It was moving away from the democratic process. 

Q: Reconciliation was one of the buzz words of the previous government. Do you think the Government could bring about post-war reconciliation among the ethnic groups successfully? 

A: No. The LKIIRSS started reconciliation conferences and did eight such conferences including conferences for religious leaders, women and business community. The idea was a recommendation of the LLRC to have a discussion with the people to develop our own process to reconciliation. Teams came from South Africa and we discussed how they did TRC. We were trying to do lots of things but we were asked to stop. This should have been invested in more and the previous Government should have focused more on this process. That didn’t happen. We had a re-engagement plan but all those efforts failed as the Government didn’t take in any research inputs. 

We have an idea to have a National Reconciliation Day together with Victory Day. But what happened was that recommendations were sent, books were printed and that was it. We couldn’t implement as a think-tank. It was a very sad situation as they could implement the recommendations.

Q: What kind of a foreign policy you propose for Sri Lanka?

A: I feel Sri Lanka’s foreign policy needs to be crafted in a way to suit our small nation which is strategically positioned. It needs to be non-aligned but working more with the rest of the world. We shouldn’t outsource foreign institutes to design our foreign policy by spending millions of rupees to draft a foreign policy for us; Sri Lankans should do this. We have brilliant diplomats who can contribute in designing the foreign policy. We should look at working with China as a giant that is growing and the US which is already a giant. I think we need to work with all nations. 

Again, doing research in foreign policy is very important. We have only one foreign policy think tank. We need to take inputs from the research papers and then craft the country’s foreign policy. When opening a foreign mission we need to find out why we need the foreign mission in a particular country, what are the benefits and why it is strategically important for the country. For example, LKIIRSS recommended to open a foreign mission in Mexico after looking at all political aspects, trade, etc. These should not be done in an ad hoc manner. If you decide to open a mission you can’t shut that mission suddenly. These things have to be looked at.

 

Q: What do you think about political appointees to foreign missions? 

A: It is a pathetic phenomenon. Everybody was complaining but nothing was happening. Foreign officers need to be trained. They don’t know even to hold a press conference and what their duties are. Most of those political appointees did not contribute well. It is bad for the country.

Q: If you are elected, what are your priorities?

A: I will definitely voice to bring the Right to Information Act. It is in my top agenda. This is a tool that empowers the citizens. I worked on a project called Telecom City in 2003, when Ranil Wickremesinghe was the Prime Minister. This is like IPL city in Bangalore, India and promised to create 100,000 jobs at that time. The idea was to create an IT city with IT technical companies and outsourcing companies. We did research in India and I want to restart that concept so that I could create some jobs.

I want to bring the World Economic Forum, in which I am involved in, to the country to bring in direct foreign investment. I have met top business people like the owner of Google and Facebook and even presidents at the World Economic Forum. I am confident that I can promote Sri Lanka through the World Economic Forum. 

Q: What are your remarks about the UNP’s manifesto – the five pillar concept?

A: It is brilliantly crafted by focusing on creating employment. One of the main issues is creating jobs. There are qualified youngsters who are not being given the right jobs. Most of them dream of going abroad. We lose them if they all go abroad. Creating one million jobs is a great idea. It is a well-designed policy.