Cash-strapped Sri Lanka on Sunday extended school closures for one week because there is not enough fuel for teachers and children to get to classrooms, as the energy minister appealed to the country’s expatriates to send money home through banks to finance new oil purchases.
A huge foreign debt has left the Indian Ocean island nation with no suppliers willing to sell fuel on credit. The available stocks, sufficient for only several days, are being provided only for essential services, including health and port workers, public transportation and food distribution, officials said.
“Finding money is a challenge. It’s a huge challenge,” Sri Lankan Minister of Power and Energy Kanchana Wijesekera said.
Photo: AP
The government has ordered new fuel stocks, and the first shipment of 40,000 tonnes of diesel is expected to arrive on Friday, while the first ship carrying gasoline is to arrive on July 22, he said.
Several other fuel shipments are scheduled, but authorities are struggling to find US$587 million to pay for the fuel, Wijesekera said, adding that Sri Lanka owes about US$800 million to seven fuel suppliers.
Schools last month were closed nationwide for one day due to fuel shortages, and remained closed for the past two weeks in urban areas. Schools are to remain shut until Friday.
Authorities yesterday also began cutting electricity countrywide for three hours per day because they cannot supply enough fuel to generating stations. Sweeping power cuts have been a blight on Sri Lanka’s economy for months, along with severe shortages of essentials including cooking gas, medicine and food imports.
Wijesekera said the main problem is the lack of money, and appealed to some 2 million Sri Lankans working abroad to send their foreign earnings home through banks instead of informal channels.
He said workers’ remittances, which usually stood at US$600 million per month, had declined to US$318 million in June.
The remittances — the nation’s main foreign exchange earner — dropped from US$2.8 billion in the first six months of last year to US$1.3 billion in the same period this year for a decline of 53 percent, according to the Sri Lankan central bank.
The drop came after the government last year ordered a mandatory conversion of foreign currency, which people have hoarded due to black-market premiums, it said.
Sri Lanka has been getting most of its fuel needs from neighboring India, which provided it with a credit line. The government said it was also negotiating with suppliers in Russia and Malaysia.
Sri Lanka has suspended repayment of about US$7 billion in foreign loans due this year out of US$25 billion to be repaid by 2026. The country’s total foreign debt is US$51 billion.
The economic meltdown has triggered a political crisis with widespread anti-government protests erupting across the country. Protesters have blocked main roads to demand gas and fuel, and television stations showed people in some areas fighting over limited stocks.
In the capital, Colombo, protesters have been occupying the entrance to the president’s office for more than two months to demand Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s resignation. They accuse him and his powerful family, which includes several siblings in top government positions, of plunging the country into the crisis through corruption and misrule.
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