Treasury Can No Longer Protect Institutions Incurring Heavy Losses: Govt. Says It Will Only Act As Regulator

State Minister of Finance Shehan Semasinghe stated that the Treasury can no longer protect institutions that are losing money or have not achieved their goals in the current economic crisis.

During a recent function at the Ministry of Finance, he emphasized that the allocation of funds from the Treasury implies the use of public money collected to maintain these institutions. Semasinghe added that the government will not burden the public by running these institutions and instead, will act as a regulatory authority.

Semasinghe reported that out of the 52 strategic government institutions, 39 are profitable, while the remaining 13 are operating at a loss, amounting to a total of 1,029 billion rupees. He added that the annual losses of government institutions exceed 811 billion rupees and that only 28 million rupees have been paid to the Treasury by profitable institutions.

Semasinghe stated that Sri Lanka needs to follow the economic methods accepted by the world due to the current economic crisis. He noted that identifying the most effective methods to stabilize the country's economy should be done independently.