Malwatte prelate wants FUTA issue resolved through dialogue

August 24, 2012, 9:47 pm


By Cyril Wimalasurendre, The Island

KANDY – Most Venerable Mahanayake of Malwatte Chapter Tibbatuwawe Sri Siddhartha Sumangala Thera stressed that the strike by the university teachers should be resolved through dialogue by a team including intellectuals. But at any cost the free education of the country should be perfected.

The Mahanayaka Thera made this remark when the Deputy Minister of Higher Education Nandimithra Ekanayaka called on him on Thursday afternoon to brief the prelate on the issue with the university teachers.

The Mahanayake cautioned that free education might be threatened by the opening of the private universities should be protected.

The facilities as well as the standard of education in the network of universities in the country should be raised, the Thera said

"It is not the revenue that is important. Admission of foreign students into the universities to be opened by the private sector should not be with the motive of foreign exchange," the prelate said.

He said tourism in the country was given priority, but there were instances where culture and values were destroyed. The coastal region and Hikkaduwa, in particular, had become sites of ill fame with the increase of tourist arrivals. There was a photograph of a foreigner embracing the image of the Buddha.

Deputy Minister of Higher Education Nandimithra Ekanayaka told the prelate that free education of the country would be protected at all costs.

Admission of foreign students to universities was a common practice in many countries, he said adding that the local students who could not get admission to State universities could enter the private universities and receive the degrees at a lower cost than from foreign universities.

Many students would be offered scholarships, he said.

The universities teachers who were on strike were hampering the education of the student population in the country’s universities, he charged.

The Deputy Minister said the university teachers were paid high salariesand cannot be raised as there was an accepted procedure for increasing salaries.

The Deputy Minister said the many demands put forward by university teachers had been resolved except the demand for the salary increase.

Thirteen universities were closed but not the Medical Faculties. Medical students did not join the students in other faculties to interrupt their own education. The universities were closed to prevent causing damage to property as well as prevent the students being drawn into disastrous activities as was done in 1971 and 1988, he added.