AKD unveils recovery blueprint, spending plan

REJECTING calls to present an interim Budget to deal with the post-Ditwah recovery, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake yesterday told Parliament that the Government has presented a Rs. 50 billion supplementary estimate to finance urgent disaster relief, with another to be presented for Rs. 500 billion in January 2026.

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He asked MPs to approve the measure, noting that it forms part of a broader package of reallocations to address the scale of economic and social damage.

He also said the Government is in discussions with the International Monetary Fund to increase the size of the next programme tranche and has requested an additional $200 million from the Fund's Special Drawing Rights window to meet immediate foreign exchange needs.

He said the IMF had proposed postponing Sri Lanka's fifth review from December to January or February following the disaster. "In December, we were due to receive a tranche of $ 324 million. We are in discussion to increase that tranche. To increase it, we need both negotiations and time," he said.

Discussions with the Asian Development Bank are also under way to secure financing for small and medium-scale enterprises affected by the floods and landslides.

The President said Ditwah was the most severe natural disaster in recent decades and that entire villages and families had been affected. "Our aim must be to create a state of higher quality than that which existed for those who lived," he said. He confirmed that 1.7 million people had been affected, 5,165 houses destroyed and 57,312 partially damaged.