Pri's blog

on http://www.agjohnson.us/ and was introduced to Bonaro Overstreet picked this from his (Allan's)  web page Stubborn Ounces (To one who doubts the worth of doing anything if you can’t do everything) You say the little efforts that I make will do no good; they will never prevail to tip the hovering scale where Justice hangs in the balance. I don’t think I ever thought they would. But I am prejudiced beyond debate in favor of my right to choose which side shall feel the stubborn ounces of my weight. Bonaro Overstreet

I am not sure what it is with the Human Development Report and the UNDP, but it must be for at least the second or third time, I was invited to talk at its launch in Colombo.  This time I was  part of a panel, moderated by Dr Indrajit Coomaraswamy, and with His Excellency, John Rankin, the British High Commissioner and Dr B M S Batagoda, Deputy Secretary to the Treasury as co-panellists.  Mr Subinay Nandy, UN Resident Coordinator and Resident Representative, chaired the proceedings, and the Hon G L Pieris, Minister of External Affairs made the keynote address, and stayed on as a panelist. Overall, the latest HDR seems to be a very different document to its predecessors.   A conversation on the semantics of the HDR and the etymology of the words used could be interesting.   Entitled “ The rise of the South: Human Progess in a Diverse World” and focused on the ‘dramatic rebalancing of world economic power’ the report can be read as one that highlight...

Ajith - contemplating the Beira Introducing Ajith, who I met this morning on my walk.  He comes often from Kompanniya Veediya where he lives to sit on this bench and watch the Beira Lake.  He is very happy that it has been cleaned up.  It was an urban jungle before, he told me.  There were shanties alongside, no room to walk around, and the lake itself was badly polluted.  They are removing the shanties in Kompanniya Veediya too, I asked.  Yes, he said, this area will become the residence of kings.  Me:where will the people go?   Ajith: Some are being sent to Avissawella, and some will get houses nearby, in Wanthamulla and other places.   Me: Isn't Avisawella too far?   Ajith: Yes of course,  but you see the governing party has not won the Colombo Municipal Council elections, it's always been UNP.  So there is a need to reconfigure the electorate and send some people away. And of course there is the importance of th...

Thought I'd share this because it is the end of  Valentine's Day 2013 I felt it in my fingers I felt it in my toes  we were rising  this evening at Lipton's Circus Colombo.. and it showed....

Our communications colleagues are urging us to write blogs... and of course Duncan Green’s OxfamBlog from Poverty to Power, shows us how it can be done, effectively and usefully for the reader.  I follow Duncan avidly while marvelling how a single person can be so widely read, so connected and with such a pulse on what is going on, at least what is going on in the UK’s international development scene.  I’d like to think that he has an army of junior Oxfam volunteers feeding him stuff, and that he has infinite time on his hands because his private life is sad and lonely – though the sense of humour and slight self-deprecation suggests otherwise.  Other bloggers maybe equally prolific e.g. Enrique Mendizabal on  onthinktanks ... but am not sure all his blogs are as grounded and relevant to us readers, some are extremely perspicacious, while others tend to ramble, the posts tend to be serious, with none of Duncan-type humour.  As for me,  I am not lik...

The gender insensitivity of  Sri Lanka's senior bureaucrats is outrageous!   Today, at the policy dialogue on Sri Lankans on the Move , an international conference on migration organised by the National Science Foundation, the top most bureaucrat  of  the Ministry that should be most sensitive to women and children issues, seemed to suggest that women's migration as domestic workers should be restricted because such migration leads to incest in the households. [He made some other interesting interventions so cannot be considered a complete write off!]  Basically, restrict women's right to movement, to earning income, achieving higher social status, becoming empowered,  just because men folk can't keep their w@!&$s  under control!  Sheez! On top of past comments by  our Ambassador to the US   and the Chairman of the SLBC  one wonders whether the women's movement needs a campaign of penile amputations Thai style , to establi...