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Destination privatisation
Step by step, state buses move out of public depots
By Nilika de Silva
Fears that the state transport services are to be privatised grew this week when the Public Enterprise Reforms Commission (PERC) invited private sector companies to invest in and manage the peoplised bus depots.

A PERC official who did not want to be identified said the move was part of a bus service restructuring programme which also envisaged steps to regulate fares and improve services.

The PERC on Thursday carried a newspaper advertisement, calling on private sector companies to invest in and manage 13 state-owned cluster bus companies.
The advertisement appeared as the government discussed a demand by private bus operators to increase bus fares and a British conglomerate expressed interest in the ailing state bus service.

The public-private partnership will require investors to bring in up to 50 percent of the equity capital of the companies while the government will retain a 50 percent stake.
According to the projected partnership, the current terms and conditions of employees will not change and no retrenchment or abolition of posts will take place while land, buildings and immovable assets will remain as Government property, and will be leased to the companies at an annual rental.

Meanwhile, opposition to the alleged privatisation moves is growing with former Transport Minister Somaweera Chandrasiri calling upon the government to immediately halt the sale of the cluster bus companies and expressing fears that some 45,000 employees would lose their jobs.

Former Deputy Transport Minister Kumara Welgama said that instead of privatisation, the government should take measures to manage the bus companies efficiently.

Defending the restructuring move, former Chairman of the Colombo Metropolitan Bus Company, M.S.M. Halavedeen, said that it was necessary as the country was no longer in a position to keep on subsidizing the cluster bus companies.

"Millions of rupees are required to subsidize these companies and it is sucking the blood of the tax payers," he said, adding that excess work force was the main problem faced by the state bus service.

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