Sun, Oct 6, 2013, 09:24 pm SL Time, ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.
Oct 06, Colombo: The parliament of Sri Lanka will have a two-day debate on the 2013 report of the parliamentary Committee on Public Enterprises (COPE).The Opposition has called for an extensive debate on the report before presenting the 2014 budget and the debate will be held on Thursday and Friday this week.
When the COPE report was presented to the House in July this year, the COPE Chairman, Senior Minister D.E.W. Gunasekera said the report would be debated in the House since the debate in the House would enable to pay more attention to the recommendations made by the committee.
The Committee in its report had made 20 recommendations after examining the accounts of 247 state institutions.
The report was the second report to be presented and has listed detailed descriptions of 16 loss-making government institutions.
The report found that 98% of the loss of the public enterprises was borne by four state companies.
Among the main institutions that have come under the scrutiny of the COPE are the cash-strapped Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB), national carrier SriLankan Airlines and the budget airline Mihin Air. The four state-owned enterprises are running at massive losses since 2011, the COPE report found.
