Friday 22nd November, 2024

Leaders of all previous governments, including those who provided political leadership for defeating the LTTE, shamefully failed to tame the rice millers’ Mafia; they took on the latter only to beat retreats with their tails between their legs. The signs are that the NPP leaders will fail to be different. They, too, have decided to import rice, unable to make a handful of large-scale millers release hoarded rice to the market.

The JVP-led NPP government is in overdrive to trace illegally assembled vehicles and have their owners arrested and prosecuted—and rightly so. It has already netted some Opposition politicians with such vehicles. It must go the whole hog to put an end to this racket, which has deprived the state coffers of a great deal of tax revenue. Curiously, it has baulked at going all out to trace illegally hoarded paddy. President Anura Kumara Dissanayake himself said at a public rally in Polonnaruwa, last month, that there was no countrywide rice shortage and ruled out the possibility of importing rice.

It has been reported that Duminda Priyadarashana, a senior agriculture economist attached to the Hector Kobbekaduwa Agrarian Research and Training Institute, informed President Dissanayake at a meeting, last month, that the country had sufficient rice stocks, according to the Agriculture Department database, and there was no need for rice imports. He rightly pointed out that rice shortages occurred whenever millers were asked to adhere to the prices stipulated by the Consumer Affairs Authority (CAA). Minister of Trade and Commerce, Food Security and Cooperative Development Wasantha Samarasinghe and NPP MP and National Organiser of the All Ceylon Farmers’ Federation, Namal Karunaratne, have also confirmed that the country has sufficient rice stocks. Thus, it is clear that the large-scale millers have created an artificial shortage of rice to jack up prices. It defies comprehension why the government has chosen to import rice.

What the NPP government, which came to power promising stringent action against those who exploit the public, should do is to order that the illegally hoarded paddy be traced and milled to make rice freely available to the public at reasonable prices. One wonders whether the ‘maroon wave’, which swept across the country last week, making the NPP’s political rivals head for the hills, has stopped at the silos of powerful millers. Why can’t the government with a two-thirds majority take on the millers’ Mafia and tame it? Importing rice, as a solution to the hoarding of paddy, is not only absurd but also indicative of a humiliating capitulation of the government to the powerful millers.

One can predict what will happen to most of the rice to be imported. The millers’ Mafia will increase the supply of locally produced rice to the market, bringing prices down; it can afford to do so because its members have already made enough profits by exploiting farmers and consumers. Rice varieties imported by governments do not appeal to Sri Lankan palates, as is public knowledge; they are likely to remain unsold and end up as animal feed. The powerful millers usually play this trick in time for the commencement of a harvesting season so that they can cause the paddy prices to fall and fleece the rice growers, but this time around they are likely to do so earlier to wrong-foot the government.

The government, we repeat, must not import rice since the rice scarcity is due to hoarding. The solution is to handle the large-scale rice millers with a firm hand and ensure that they obey the law. Let the NPP be urged to grasp the nettle.

It is hoped that the leaders of the new government are not beholden to the wealthy millers, unlike their predecessors who benefited from the largesse of the unscrupulous rice mudalali fraternity at the expense of consumers and farmers.