Ravi’s secret admirer waits to do him honour

Ah! there he stands, probably with an untaxed bubbly in his hands whilst the region’s banking world sings ‘For he’s a jolly good fellow.’

The long awaited accolade came this week for Ravi Karunanayake when he became the cover boy of the Banker, the London based international finance magazine which chose him as the Finance Minister of the Year for Asia-Pacific for his sterling efforts to steer Sri Lanka into a new era of economic reform and a change of mindset.

But what price the Banking Idol award?

See the litany of his achievements.

According to Ravi’s Finance Ministry, it is for securing a $ 1.5 billion International Monetary Fund loan program: for reducing the Lankan budget deficit from 7% in January 2015 to 5.4% in 2016, for making government revenue rise from Rs. 1205 in 2014 is never valued in his homeland but only hailed and honoured abroad.

But Ravi should not despair the sound of silence. His efforts in nation building by imposing further taxes on the people have not gone unnoticed and unappreciated. At least one Lankan admirer is waiting to grant him state honours when the propitious time dawns for him to do so.

Emerging from the Welikada Prison on Thursday where he had gone to see his old comrade Wimal Weerawansa, former president Mahinda Rajapaksa told the media that he was waiting to bestow on the award winning Lankan Finance Minister another award of his own, when he comes to power, which he said will be shortly. In Mahinda’s own words, “the award for precipitating the present government’s downfall by heaping burdens on the people”.