Sri Lanka, May 6 -- May Day came and went. Yet very few words were spoken regarding working conditions in the country. Strangely, it was the head of state that raised the problem of wages while addressing the Ceylon Workers' Congress May Day rally in Nuwara Eliya.
President Wickremesinghe announced a pay rise for estate workers and justified the upward revision of payment with reference to the historic role the upcountry Tamil estate workers continued to play in keeping our country's economy afloat.
However, hardly had the ink on the newspapers dried, when the Planters' Association fully objected to the promised pay rise to low-level workers. The Association said its members would be filing objections to the proposals.
What the Associati...