President Anura Kumara Dissanayake announced on Sunday that the Government will allocate Rs. 41 billion for a fuel subsidy covering the next three months, with a Cabinet paper seeking approval for the money to be placed before ministers on Monday.
Speaking at a public rally in Gampaha, the President said the concessions are intended to run through October, November and December, Daily Mirror reported.
The subsidy would be provided “without passing the full cost of fuel on to the public,” he said, according to NewsFirst. He attributed the Government’s ability to absorb the cost to the economic position it has built up.
What this settles, and what it does not
The announcement puts a figure and a timeline on a subsidy that until now had been described only in general terms. On Friday, Energy Minister Anura Karunathilaka said a diesel subsidy of between Rs. 80 and Rs. 100 a litre was under consideration, with the final figure to be fixed only after data on fuel retailers’ losses had been analysed.
Neither report published on Sunday says whether that Rs. 80–100 range survives into the Cabinet paper, how the Rs. 41 billion divides between diesel and petrol, or how it is split across the three months. Sri Lanka revises fuel prices at the start of each month, so the first test of the subsidy falls on 1 October — before which the Cabinet must act.
Daily Mirror also reports the President as saying the Government had previously allocated Rs. 100 billion in relief after fuel prices rose on the back of conflict in the Middle East. NewsFirst does not carry that figure, and we were unable to corroborate it from a second newsroom.
Hiru News independently confirms the three-month scope and puts the Cabinet submission at “tomorrow (28)” — Monday, 28 September — with the President saying further measures will follow promptly once approval is granted. Hiru gives the rally its Sinhala name, Vasara Dekai – Ratata Subhai. It does not carry the Rs. 41 billion figure.
Also at the rally
The President said there would be no limit to action against those who have taken public property, that some investigations now require international assistance, and that the Government was not pursuing political revenge. He said the rule of law must apply equally, and that racism would no longer be used as a route to political power — claiming two years had passed without a police complaint arising from racial conflict.
