Sri Lanka to amend electricity law to remove impediments to procurement

Sri Lanka will amend its electricity law to remove impediments to procurement, said Power and Energy Minister Kanchana Wijesekera on Monday.

Sri Lanka will amend its electricity law to remove impediments to procurement, said Power and Energy Minister Kanchana Wijesekera on Monday. "The law will be amended to remove impediments that delayed projects and to shorten the procurement processes," Xinhua quoted the minister as saying.

Wijesekera said that he was consulting with senior officers to overcome the current fuel crisis. He further said that he would soon present to parliament a report on the causes of the fuel crisis, especially the weak management at key institutions, Xinhua reported.

"We have also paid for a ship carrying coal needed for electricity production. With this we have enough coal until September," he said. Sri Lanka is facing its worst economic crisis since independence with food and fuel shortages, soaring prices and power cuts affecting a large number of the people, resulting in massive protests over the government's handling of the situation.

The recession is attributed to foreign exchange shortages caused by a fall in tourism during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as reckless economic policies, like the government's move last year to ban chemical fertilizers in a bid to make Sri Lanka's agriculture "100 per cent organic". Due to an acute shortage of Foreign exchange, Sri Lanka recently defaulted on the entirety of its foreign debt amounting to about USD 51 billion.

The economic situation has led to huge protests with demands for the resignation of Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. (ANI)

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)