Monday Jun 15, 2026
Monday Jun 15, 2026
Monday, 15 June 2026 06:23 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Parliament’s Committee on Public Finance (CoPF) has cautioned against allowing non-technical interpretations circulating on social media to shape public understanding of economic developments, urging authorities to communicate complex economic data more effectively before misinformation gains traction.
The issue arose during a discussion last week with Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) Governor Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe and senior officials on the recent controversy surrounding an approximately $ 808 million discrepancy recorded under Sri Lanka’s balance of payments statistics.
CoPF Chairman Dr. Harsha de Silva said technical economic matters were increasingly being interpreted without proper context and amplified through social media, often resulting in misleading conclusions and politicised narratives.
“We should not allow non-technical interpretations to become the narrative,” Dr. de Silva said, adding that authorities needed to think carefully about how technical information is presented to the wider public so that such issues do not become political footballs.
The Governor directly rejected claims circulating on social media that Sri Lanka had somehow “lost” $ 808 million.
“I saw social media reports saying that Sri Lanka lost $ 808 million. That is completely unfounded. There is nothing lost by the CBSL and nothing lost by anyone. It is a discrepancy in data recording,” Dr. Weerasinghe told the Committee.
He explained that the figure represented the balance of payments balancing item known as “net errors and omissions,” which arises because transactions are compiled from multiple sources and do not always reconcile perfectly.
According to the Governor, discrepancies of this nature are common in balance of payments accounting and are recorded to ensure that overall accounts balance.
He noted that the latest discrepancy amounted to around 0.25% of GDP, significantly below levels seen in some previous years, including approximately 0.9% of GDP in 2021.
“If this moves to 2% or 3% of GDP, then we have to investigate further and improve the compilation process,” he said.
The discussion also touched on the importance of presenting technical economic information in formats that can be readily understood by the wider public, with lawmakers stressing that greater clarity and accessibility would help reduce speculation and misinformation.
