President Ranil Wickremesinghe faces uphill task in Sri Lanka
Although the IMF wants to complete the rescue conversation with Sri Lanka as soon as possible, the election of Ranil Wickremesinghe, who is the prince of the pearls, as president shows that everything will become much worse in the island country before they start to be better.
Ranil Wickremesinghe is very unpopular with the mass, which has been gripped with lack of fuel, food, and other important things after the foreign reserves dry. In such a way that he was often ridiculed as Ranil Rajapaksa by the public because he was seen as a Front for the Rajapaksa Empire and as Prime Minister five times and several times the Minister of Finance was also seen by the public as the main contributor for them economic chaos. However, as someone who has dealt with the IMF in the past, Ranil also has an opportunity in this case if he can ease the economic situation in this country and restore its credibility. This is easier to say than done because the public today must wait three to four days for gas cylinders and four to five days to get motor vehicle fuel.
While the Implementing Director of IMF Kristalina Georgieva has stated that he wants to negotiate with Sri Lanka on the economic rescue package that must be completed as quickly as possible, the Kolombo track record with the Bretton Woods Institution is not anything to write. It has not been able to close negotiations with the IMF at least six to seven times in the past. Sri Lanka Pre-emptive default in her foreign debt for the first time earlier this year after Pandemi destroyed the tourism sector in essence. At present, this country has high inflation with one US dollar equivalent to 360 Rupees Sri Lanka and depreciation quickly.
Since the economic crisis began, India has contributed USD 3.8 billion to Sri Lanka without Quid Pro Quo. Apart from conflicting suggestions from members of the parliament, the Modi government has chosen not to intervene in any way with the Sri Lanka government except to provide support in the form of food, fuel, fertilizer, and medicines with long -term goals stabilizing neighbors. This has not yet happened to the other Sri Lanka debtors, which provided high flowering loans to the Rajapaksa Empire to show off white elephant infra-projects that could not live economically like the country’s economic collapse. People should not forget that if the humiliated Rajapaksas allowed the entry of China to Sri Lanka, Ranil who gave a 99 -year -old Hambantota lease to Beijing. Countries such as Pakistan, Maldives and Nepal also headed in the same direction and were under Chinese debt traps. Japan, another Sri Lanka’s main debtor, also refused to provide credit until then the right government was restored in the country. West Beyond supports Ranil at all does not care because he was involved in a war that never ended in Ukraine.
It is very clear that the public mood in Sri Lanka opposed Ranil Wickremesinghe when they burned his private home. His selection as president is also a slap in public because he is only a member nominated from the Sri Lanka parliament and one of his party’s face. The public may not be friendly to this political manipulation and will be more nervous if the economic situation is not treated immediately. And this is not possible without giving more pain to the public because the IMF will establish hard conditions in the form of tax rationalization, work cutting and layoffs to reduce government weight.
With IMF MD clearly shows that the risk of global recession has increased with China to “significant ranking decline” from the estimated growth of 4.4 percent in the April Institutional Projection, the world towards waters and countries that have not been mapped such as Sri Lanka and Pakistan will bear the fire in terms of economic and political uncertainty. President Ranil Wickremesinghe faces the task of climbing in saving the Sri Lanka economy with political uncertainty that rises in the horizon.