Tea Board chairman stays on - Despite presidential order to quit

The Chairman of the Tea Board B.A.C. Abeywardene was ordered to resign by the President’s Office last week but true to form, he refused to quit.

The order came from Lalith Weeratunga, Secretary to President Mahinda Rajapaksa who told the Secretary of the Plantations Industries Ministry J. Abeywickrema that Abeywardane must tender his resignation. Plantations Minister Milroy Fernando confirmed to The Sunday Times FT that the president’s secretary has written to the ministry secretary asking that the chairman hand in his resignation.

“The chairman has sent the Tea Board Director General on compulsory leave without consulting the minister or the secretary to the ministry on the matter. However the DG is paid his full salary with all the benefits. The matter has got out of hand now,” the minister said.

H.D. Hemaratne, the ‘suspended Tea Board Director General, is still waiting for his ‘charge sheet’ nearly a month after being sent on compulsory leave. “I am waiting for the charge sheet so that I could request an inquiry. Action should be taken only based on the results of an inquiry,” he said. Hemaratne is widely regarded as an honest and competent officer and has been clashing with the chairman over financial and administrative matters. Minister Fernando said Abeywardene has been reassigned as coordinating secretary to the president.

However when asked about this decision, Abeywardane told The Sunday Times FT that he has refused to take up the new appointment and is not resigning from his post. “If I want to I can work in both positions. But I do not wish to do so as I am too busy,” said Abeywardane.

Abeywardene also said neither the President’s secretary nor the ministry secretary has anything to do with the Tea Board.

Stunned stakeholders of the industry including private sector representatives on the Tea Board who have watched with concern as the events unfolded, have been trying to resolve the issue. Representatives of the industry met the minister to discuss the course of action to develop the . . .

industry where the Tea Board saga was also discussed. “The meeting with the minister was extremely good. He regretted that a crisis of this nature has taken place in the industry where the policy matters of the board is met with a serious conflict as the chairman of the board holds strange views,” a member of the Tea Board directorate who declined to be named, said.

The directors are also concerned about the loss of confidence of the tea export trade who undertook various state-approved promotion campaigns overseas in 2005 as the chairman is released the money due to exporters.

“This type of action is not going to help the industry as this is a time that value added brands should be promoted heavily. The exporters have lost confidence in the Tea Board and this is detrimental to the industry,” he said.

Another crisis is that Tea Board Promotion Centres overseas have not got all their funding for 2005 and are in deep financial trouble, other industry sources said