Shortly after he became Prime Minister again on November 29 last year, Mahinda Rajapaksa invited the chief executives of the country’s banking sector to a meeting with his senior economics advisor and former central bank governor, Nivard Cabraal.
Rajapaksa and Cabraal purportedly wanted the banks to roll out a 12- to 18-month moratorium on their entire loan portfolios to get the Sri Lankan economy back on its feet again. It is not hard to imagine the stunned silence and consternation that must have greeted such a request.
As negotiating tactics go, it was one straight out of the US president’s playbook. Ask for something completely outrageous knowing...
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