How One Powerful Family Destroyed A Country

this video is brought to you by curiositystream and nebula my online streaming platform hi welcome to another cold fusion video this is sri lanka population 22 million and an independent island off the coast of southern india not long ago they were south asia's most developed nation but right now they're in a severe economic crisis the country is 51 billion dollars in debt rolling blackouts are rampant the currency is crashing medication fuel and some food is in short supply even school exams had to be cancelled because of the shortage of printing paper an economic crisis in sri lanka which is becoming increasingly dramatic with residents life savings virtually disappearing into thin air one estimate from johns hopkins university shows real inflation at over 130 percent in march the government is even asking airlines to stop refueling in the country to save on fuel many sri lankans have had enough of the horrific situation the homes of government officials have been torched and the sitting prime minister even had to flee to a naval base for his own safety protesters have also stolen the presidential residence they were swimming in the president's pool eating his food and drinking his alcohol so how could such a disaster happen well first we need to look at the rajapaksas family you are watching cold fusion tv [Music] the rajapaksas has been a powerful family in the country for a while their wealth came from rice and coconut farming and their power from their activities and politics in trilankan politics you have to be somebody to be elected as rosine sally a professor at the national university of singapore told the washington post quote you cannot win in politics if you're not from an established family the second of nine children mahinda rajapaksa became president in 2005 and for 10 years the country became a family business as the family's influence grew soon other brothers sons nephews cousins daughter-in-laws and other relatives joined the government occupying top positions in various administrations sri lanka was now a family affair mahinda named his brother gotabaya as defence secretary while basil and their oldest brother jamal were placed in charge of irrigation and economic development sri lanka enjoyed years of growth fueled by a mountain of foreign debt but for much of their rule things were going well despite some critics many sri lankans were fans of the ruling family not only for bringing up the country in social standing but also for bringing peace to the nation from 1983 to 2009 there was a horrific civil war in the country a rebel group called the temple tigers would fight against the government citing discrimination after a 26-year military campaign the sri lankan armed forces militarily defeated the tamil tigers in may of 2009 and this brought the civil war to an end at this time the president and the defense ministry were brothers after the defeat of the rebels the pair were held as heroes mahinda enjoyed the adulation of voters who approved of his bloody yet decisive victory in a 26-year civil war against the tamil rebels but it wasn't a squeaky clean image for the brothers allegations of corruption including questionable deals with chinese state counterparts swirled around mahinda his brother gotabaya was also implicated though to a lesser extent he was facing scrutiny over the purchase of mig fighters from ukraine but these scandals didn't stop the family from spending big he promised huge infrastructure projects including a chinese-built airport which sits largely empty he tried to jumpstart growth by borrowing heavily and attracting foreign capital by propping up the sri lankan rupee in the short term the strategy worked the economy boomed causing a per capita gross domestic product to more than double from 2006 to 2014. this vaulted sri lanka past ukraine the philippines and indonesia it lifted 1.6 million people out of poverty and gave rise to a large middle class by 2019 sri lanka ascended to the ranks of the world bank's upper middle-income countries though all of that growth came at a cost sri lanka's external debt tripled from 2006 to 2012 pushing total public debt to 119 percent of gdp in 2015 these policies were suspended but the debt continued to accumulate with each passing year the family government made even more mistakes each mistake led to ever greater risk [Music] when the military brother gotabaya got into power in 2019 he promised tax cuts to get elected when this came around the government lost 25 percent of its revenue to make things worse in 2020 covert smashed tourism for sri lanka tourist income was a huge source of funding to pay back foreign debt then 2021 rolls around and russia and ukraine go to war in an ill twist of fate before the war russians frequently made up the biggest share of sri lankan's turrets with ukrainians not far behind as the flights to moscow were suspended and the ukrainians are at war sri lanka's tourism industry suffers even more in april of 2021 the rajapaksa government made another fatal mistake to prevent the drain of foreign exchange reserves all fertilizer imports were completely banned this move was extremely radical as no country can feasibly run their food supply on 100 organic fertilizer on a whim farmers overnight had to stop producing and the food supply collapsed the country had to start importing rice and other food goods and the price of food exploded rubber and tea two major exports also ground to a halt the government reversed the policy in november of 2021 but the damage was already done last year in a highly controversial move the sri lankan government banned the use and import of chemical fertilizers overnight in a bid to become the first country in the world to fully adopt organic farming while the ban was later reversed after protest the crop yield was already affected the income we get is not enough to cover our expenses this is the only work we do we have no other work and then things went from bad to worse the country was spending more than it made imported more than it exported as a consequence its foreign reserves began to run dry this in itself isn't too unusual as a lot of countries do this and end up borrowing more money to keep themselves afloat but the difference here is that the foreign debt for sri lanka is so high that they can't even pay the interest to keep the debt expansion going to make things even worse oil prices were exploding internationally so importing that cost even more than normal and being a small island dependent on deliveries by sea made this a nightmare for sri lanka the inability to import led to food shortages as foreign exchange reserves remain under strain in february of 2022 the official inflation numbers rose to 17.5 by june it was 55 [Music] the price of cooking gas for example is almost three times higher than it was just a few months ago even printing paper is hard to come by forcing schools to close and cancel exams in march of 2022 the sri lankan rupee posted its biggest single day decline in more than 40 years these next numbers highlight just how fast the situation is deteriorating sri lanka's foreign currency reserves at the end of 2019 stood at 7.6 billion this had fallen to 1.93 billion in march of 2020 and by july of 2022 all that remains is 50 million there is no longer enough foreign currency to import basics such as fuel on june 29th 2022 the country suspended fuel sales it only had enough fuel for just one more day and it will be given out in absolute emergencies it was the first country to ban sales of petrol since the fuel crisis in the 1970s before long the situation was horrific citizens began starving and there was a shortage of everything food and fuel being the most pressing long fuel lines are a common sight arguments occur and fights break out one rickshaw driver even dies of heat stroke the government is now so short on funds that it's going to start printing money to pay employees salaries and most of us know how that turns out it's basically the end of the line for the sri lankan economy sri lanka no longer has money to import goods and they can no longer function to produce enough revenue in april the government defaulted on its external debt worth 51 billion 7 billion more is due at the end of the year starting in early april of 2021 protests began to erupt all over sri lanka at first the government tried to squash the protesters triggering deadly crashes across the country but they couldn't hold back the tide of anger the rajapaksa brothers once held by many as heroes for winning the civil war are now reviled as leaders it's a dramatic fall from grace for a family that dominated sri lankan politics for over a decade the former president mahinda rajapaksa had to be evacuated from his official residence after protesters attempted to storm the house other family houses at the rajapaksas have also been targeted elsewhere in sri lanka people are so frustrated because of rajapaksa we need our money back we need our country back we are here to support us these people i mean everyone can see that how much we're suffering there's lines everywhere gas petrol currently sri lanka isn't a very risky situation with great uncertainty and just to highlight this as i was finishing up the episode more news broke on june 10th hundreds of thousands of protesters broke into president gottayaba's official residence [Applause] and they swarmed into the office of a president already fled [Applause] at 10 am local time he fled gotayaba's motorcade was seen speeding down the highway out of the city his secretary and other officials didn't know his whereabouts but he was later stopped at the airport trying to flee the country to dubai after he left protesters wearing helmets and waving sri lankan flags broke into the president's residence some cooking food in the kitchen while others are seen swimming in the pool there was even a piano sing-along in one of the rooms to lift morale and for the first time several sri lankan military personnel joined the protesters marking a turning point in the government's control of the situation the protests and storming of the government residents also shows what happens when governments lose control of an economy all other world governments should be watching this closely overall it's a tragic situation a potent combination of government mismanagement and external economic and geopolitical factors moreover without a stable government it's going to be very difficult to negotiate loans or restructure the country's debts so it looks like the end of the rajapaksa family dynasty and the long years of complete control it exercised over this island nation so how can this be fixed well basically the only option is to get loans sri lanka is seeking emergency loans of 3 billion to pay for essential imports such as fuel the world bank has agreed to lend 600 million and the government is also asking for 4 billion from the international mandatory fund the imf said that the government must raise interest rates and taxes as a condition for the loan which would make the country's cost of living crisis even worse they're also seeking help from china india qatar australia japan the us and more sri lanka and india have signed a 1 billion credit line for importing essentials including food and medicine sri lanka owes 6.5 billion dollars to china and the two are in talks on how to restructure the debt china agreed to bolster sri lanka's foreign currency reserves by swapping the sri lankan rupee for its currency the remnimi though since then china has signaled displeasure over sri lanka also approaching the imf for help the rajapaksas are now not only concerned for their political future but also for their safety and security when a new government takes over we can only hope that things turn around for the nation and they can get the resources they need to rebuild their economy no citizen of any nation deserves what has happened to the people of sri lanka so i've been sitting on the script for a couple of months just waiting and seeing if things would improve but they really haven't so i think it's ultimately important that people know what's going on here so stay safe out there if you're from sri lanka generally speaking the news cycle can be quite negative but what if you could just leave it all behind put a stop to the endless doom scrolling and internet arguments well that's what many people have started to do it's a phenomena dubbed the dumb phone revolution it's living a life with a phone that only does calls and texts i've made a cold fusion episode on it and it's an interesting look into why and how this is happening if you want to see this episode right now you can head to my streaming platform nebula nebula is a streaming platform made by creators for creators it's going to allow me to experiment with different kinds of content without having to worry about demonetization or the algorithm and best of all it's ad-free nebula features youtube's best educational content creators like real engineering polymatter and mustard nebula is partnering with curiosity stream we have a deal where you can sign up with the link below not only to get access to curiosity stream but you'll also get nebula for free it's not a trial you'll have it as long as you're a curiosity stream member curiosity stream has thousands of documentaries everything from edward snowden to the vietnam war to space and quantum physics to the soothing voice of david attenborough it's all there for a limited time curiosity stream is offering 26 off their annual plan that's less than 15 dollars per year for both curiosity stream and nebula it really is the best deal in streaming it's a great way to support my channel and educational content as a whole so click the link in the description or go to the url clicking that link really helps my channel thank you some housekeeping before i leave you for those of you who follow my music be sure to check out my new album hello world on bandcamp it'll be on spotify soon but yeah that's it from me my name is dagogo and you've been watching cold fusion and i'll see you again soon for the next episode cheers guys have a good [Music] you

Channel: ColdFusion

Views: 5,263,765

Keywords: Coldfusion, TV, Dagogo, Altraide, Technology, Apple, Google, Samsung, Facebook, Tesla

Id: wR3ZJ1wg6Hc

Length: 15min 45sec (945 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 14 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/buddha_baba]

"ek vari phir sheeeerrrrrrrr"

"bhutto zindaaaa haaiii"

[u/ttak82]

Aahh Coldfusion covering this topic. Love their content.

[u/[deleted]]

Yeah, but IK mentioned Allah(swt) in a speech once, so he is basically Hitler x1000, so we should bring back the Bhuttos and Sharifs for "progress".

/s

[u/marloweiriis]

Lessons to be learned. I'm really sad for my Sri Lankan friends and families, some of the warmest people I ever lived with.

[u/CompetitiveBunch2996]

We have the bhuttos, the zardaris and the shareefs 🤡

[u/[deleted]]

[removed]

[u/Own-Tourist-1479]

We gave them the power to destroy us.