Opposition parliamentarians are up in arms against the government’s failure to provide them with decentralised funds for this year.

Even though over five months of 2010 have already lapsed, the Rajapaksa regime was the least bit concerned about the obligations of opposition MPs towards their electorates, Chief Opposition Whip John Ameratunga told The Island yesterday.

"This is yet another case of step motherly treatment that we are being given. I will raise the issue at the party leaders’ meeting and move that the government speedily release decentralised funds due to parliamentarians, he said.

"It is Opposition MPs who are the most affected. Ruling party legislators need not worry because they have the backing of the entire State machinery."

Ameratunga said that he would also present a motion for decentralised funds to be doubled, because the sum of Rs. 5 million, which MP’s received annually, was grossly inadequate for development work.

The masses also expected the government to honour the pledges it had made during the Presidential and Parliamentary elections, Amaratunga said. Promises to reduce the prices of essential goods and services and salary increases for public servants were yet to be implemented, he said.

Commenting on the Opposition’s campaign for chairmanship of the Committee on Public Enterprise (COPE) and Public Accounts Committee(PAC), Ameratunga said that it was continuing and they would stake their claim at the appropriate moment.

"We will call for a vote to elect the Chairmen of COPE and PAC. There is no option, because the Leader of the House Nimal Siripala de Silva has not responded positively to our request that the two committees be headed by Opposition parliamentarians," he said "The last UNP-led UNF government gave the chairmanship of both COPE and PAC to the then Opposition. But, the Rajapaksa regime does not think it fit to reciprocate our gesture. This shows that they are not serious about good governance."

The government by appointing over ten ministers to COPE and PAC had also disregarded the Opposition’s request that ministers not serve on vital watchdog committees inquiring into the manner in which the country’s finances were spent, Ameratunga said.