Sri Lanka’s MCC compact grant in the balance for the past two months

The offer of an MCC grant of US$480 million to Sri Lanka may not be available for much longer although the new government will have to wait for at least two months till the release of the special committee study report on the draft agreement.

The MCC Board held its last meeting for the year 2019 on December 9 and reviewed the performance to select and deselect countries for 2020 assistance.

But its decision is still to be made public although Sri Lanka was not in the list of countries in the MCC 2020 scorecard released recently, a senior official said, adding that further delay in ratifying the agreement in Parliament will result in the termination of the offer.

However according to unconfirmed reports, the MCC board had decided to postpone the grant until they had time to evaluate the performance of Sri Lanka’s new government.

A special committee headed by Prof. Lalithsiri Gunaruwan of the University of Colombo is now conducting a detailed study on the $480 million MCC compact grant taking into consideration public representations of some selected experts and intellectuals.

Prof. Gunaruwan told the Business Times that they will be submitting their recommendations with safety clauses to the MCC compact agreement within the next two months.

The mandate given to the committee which includes former Secretary to the Ministry of Transport D. S. Jayaweera, President's Counsel Nihal Jayawardena and architect and public interest activist Nalaka Jayaweera is to review public representations and submit a report within four months commencing January 2020.

Any individual, institution or an organisation can submit their views on the content of the agreement or the effect it can cause before February 15 (yesterday) this year, he said adding that the committee has already received a large number of public representations.

These views and suggestions of the public are now being studied by the committee, he disclosed, pointing out that they will have to seek the opinion of local experts before making recommendations to the government.

Sometime ago the US Embassy, in a statement noted, that Parliament will have ample opportunity to review the MCC grant assistance agreement once it is signed.

“Consistent with the MCC worldwide policy in all partner countries, once the grant assistance ag reement is signed, the Government of Sri Lanka will send it to Parliament for approval,” it said.

Meanwhile Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Jonathan Henick stated that the US hopes that the substantial American grant to Sri Lanka will be a success.

He noted that this grant from his country would benefit millions of Sri Lankans by reducing traffic congestion.