Opposition MP Harsha de Silva told Parliament on Wednesday that President Anura Kumara Dissanayake takes economic advice from Duminda Hulangamuwa, who also advised former President Ranil Wickremesinghe.
“Ranil Wickremesinghe’s economic osthar was Duminda Hulangamuwa and he is also the economic osthar of President Dissanayake,” de Silva said, the Daily Mirror reported at 9.20 p.m. The Sinhala word osthar, carried untranslated in the report, means something closer to “expert” or “authority” than to a formal job title, and the MP used it to make a point rather than to describe an appointment.
This is a claim by an opposition MP, made in Parliament. It is not an independently confirmed fact. No filing reports any confirmation from the President’s office, from Hulangamuwa, or from the government.
The argument being made
De Silva’s point was not that the adviser is unsuitable. It was that the government criticises the former president’s economic policies while taking advice from the man who shaped them.
The irony, he said, is that those in government criticise Wickremesinghe’s economic policies though they were implemented following Hulangamuwa’s advice.
Stated plainly, the argument is about continuity: if the counsel is the same, the policy direction is likely the same, and the criticism is therefore about authorship rather than substance. It is a rhetorical argument, and it stands or falls on a factual premise — that Hulangamuwa advises both — which the Daily Mirror reports as de Silva’s assertion and nothing more.
What the report does not contain is any account of what advice was given, on what, or when. Without that, the continuity claim cannot be assessed. Two governments can take counsel from the same person and reach different policies.
The exchange that prompted it
The remark followed a comment from Minister Sunil Handunetti, who said the government accepts there are able people in the opposition.
“There is one such person sitting right opposite to where I am standing,” Handunetti said, pointing at de Silva, who was seated on the opposition benches at the time.
De Silva’s reply inverted it. He noted that some in government acknowledge there are able people in the opposition who could work for the betterment of the nation — then named an adviser the government has in common with its predecessor.
So the sequence is a compliment from the government benches answered by an argument that the government’s economics are not its own. The Daily Mirror does not report a response from Handunetti or any minister.
Who Duminda Hulangamuwa is
The Daily Mirror’s report does not describe him beyond the two advisory roles it attributes to him, and this desk is not filling that gap from memory. No filing on Wednesday states his current designation, whether any appointment is formal or informal, whether it is paid, or when it began.
That matters for how the claim should be read. An economic adviser formally appointed to the President is a different thing from a businessman whose views are sought, and the report distinguishes neither.
Not reported
Neither the President’s office nor Hulangamuwa is reported as having responded. The report does not say in what debate the exchange occurred, does not give the date or nature of any advisory appointment, and does not report any government rebuttal of the central claim.
It does not state what economic policies de Silva was referring to, or which of them the government has criticised. It gives no indication that de Silva produced any document or other evidence in support of the assertion.
On sourcing. This is a single-source report. Parliamentary exchanges of this kind are often carried by one outlet on the day; no other verified newsroom had filed on the remarks at the time of writing, roughly an hour and a half after the Daily Mirror, and Ada Derana remains unreachable from this desk after more than a month of CloudFront blocks.
Source: Daily Mirror.