by Ifham Nizam

Opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe Tuesday said the services rendered by Professor G.L. Peiris to the nation and his contribution towards peace talks with the LTTE, would go down in Sr Lanka’s history.

Addressing an United National Party Executive Committee at Soysapura, Wickremesinghe said that Professor Peiris was the key figure in negotiating peace in both the Peoples’ Alliance and the United National Front Governments.

He said that his relationship with Peiris went back to his University days where the Professor used to give lectures on law.

He added that even when Peiris was in the Opposition camp they had a good relationship.

Wickremesinghe said he had never forgotten of those who were politically victimised but he had not been in a position to attend to their grievances as there were no adequate resources when he was the Prime Minister.

However, he said, at that time he was planning to allocate rupees 200 million to those who were politically victimised in 2004 and was hoping to satisfy everybody at that time, but his government was not in a position to give anything as everything was under President Kumaratunga.

He said that was the reason his government had gone to the Tokyo Donor Conference and later introduced the Regaining Sri Lanka policy. He claimed that during his tenure as Prime Minister, he had strengthened the country’s economy within two years especially by strengthening the value of rupee.

Former Lands Minister Rajitha Senaratne said that the UNP were able to get the big sharks like Professor Peiris, S.B.Dissanayake, Mahinda Wijesekera and it would take only a matter minutes to get the present sprats in Parliament.

He warned the United Peoples’ Freedom Alliance that they could have the majority in Parliament at any time but the opposition had to get it only once.

Senaratne also accused President Kumaratunga of destroying their hard work.

He said that when the UNP comes to power shortly they will rule the country for the next 20 years.

Moratuwa UNP Chief Organiser Professor G.L.Peiris said that the United National Front government had had a vision and progressed in the peace talks by having six round table talks with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam but the present government destroyed all that through sheer selfishness.

Peiris also said that President Chandrika Kumaratunga had come to power by making false promises, such as she would bring down the cost of living.

He added that she had failed to safeguard the masses against skyrocketing prices of essential goods.