People’s representatives of the respective districts have expressed their appreciation to Prime Minister Dinesh Gunawardena for getting Cabinet approval for upgrading seven Urban Councils to Municipal Councils recently. The Cabinet Paper presented by Prime Minister Dinesh Gunawardena to convert seven Urban Councils into Municipal Councils and three Local Councils into Municipal Councils was approved by the Cabinet recently.
The Cabinet decided to convert the Urban Councils of Kalutara, Vavuniya, Puttalam, Trincomalee, Mannar, Ampara, Kegalle into Municipalities and Kilinochchi, Mullaitivu and Moneragala as Local Councils.
There are currently 24 Municipalities, 41 Municipal Councils and 276 Local Councils in Sri Lanka and the total number of Local Government institutions is 341.
A ranking of 10 major cities in 25 administrative districts of Sri Lanka will be done this year and this will be relevant to the development of those provinces as well as to raise the standard of living of the people.
Under the more powerful Municipal Council Ordinance, the Local Government naturally possesses many unique legal legacies. Among them are the laws and regulations for the administration of many areas such as health, education, transport, social welfare, etc., as well as receiving special tax revenues.
Parliamentarian Wimalaweera Dissanayake said that the Prime Minister deserves commendation for upgrading Ampara Urban Council into Municipal Council status. He said that it was not possible to turn Ampara, which was the centre of the historic Galoya Development Scheme, into a Municipal Council for decades.
“Prime Minister Gunawardena should be appreciated for his mission as the minister in charge of the Public Administration Ministry for accomplishing this historic task”, Parliamentarian Dissanayake said.
Ampara District Parliamentarian D. Weerasinghe also hailed the Prime Minister’s move to turn the Ampara UC into Municipal Council status.
“Ampara was the main city since the Gal Oya Development Project was launched by the country’s first Minister of Agriculture and Lands D. S. Senanayake,” Weerasinghe said.
Wanni Parliamentarian Selvam Adaikalanathan, Vavuniya District Coordinating Committee Chairman and Wanni District Parliamentarian Kulasingham Dileepan also expressed their appreciation on behalf of the people in the Vavuniya District for upgrading the Vavunia UC to Municipal Council status.
by Daily News Sri Lanka
, Political, ,