President Mahinda Rajapaksa has requested all Secretaries of Ministries to work seven days a week instead of the present five. Could the North have been liberated if the security forces worked only for five days, he said.

President Rajapaksa, who met with all ministry secretaries at Temple Trees on Tuesday, said that post tsunami allocations made to the North had not been properly utilised and that some NGOs and INGOs had neglected to support tsunami victims.

According to a spokesman of the Presidential Secretariat, he had told the ministry secretaries to work with a sense of dedication and responsibility and carry out his instructions without delay.

The presidential instructions include entrance facilities to disabled people at State institutions, to place orders for all stationery required by the State sector offices with the Embilipitiya and Valaichenai paper mills and to provide a monthly progress report of all ministries to the Presidential Secretariat

The President wanted priority to Lake House newspapers when placing government advertisements and arrangements for the renting out of all unoccupied government owned buildings.