Mangala reveals plans to revamp Foreign Office

 By Ashwin Hemmathagama – Our Lobby Correspondent 

Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera yesterday told Parliament about several measures his Ministry was putting in place to convert the country’s diplomatic service into a professional, merit-based system to meet modern global challenges and attract foreign investments.  

Taking a three step approach all unqualified and corrupt political appointees of the previous government were changed, he informed. 

“People who used embassies for tea trading and gun running were removed. We replaced many of them with officers from the Foreign Service – the ratio of Foreign Service heads of mission doubled within a single year from a third to two-thirds. Because of the lack of qualified officers of the appropriate grade, we appointed business people, academics and other eminent and qualified persons to be Heads of Missions,” the Foreign Minister claimed.

He said that in the longer term, his ministry was restructuring the foreign ministry to ensure that its resources are developed, deployed and managed as efficiently as possible. “This is why we are closing down missions where there is no clear rationale for existence,” he said.

As a part of the ongoing transformation, a team of officials have recently returned from studying the Singaporean Foreign Ministry. 

“Based on their recommendations we are about to introduce a scheme for non-resident ambassadors to increase representation while cutting costs; a human resources division to ensure that members of the Foreign Service are selected rigorously, trained regularly and rewarded for results. Perhaps most importantly, we are putting in place the necessary checks, balances and controls to ensure that the service is accountable. We will soon roll out a scheme of regular inspections at our missions abroad that will not only audit financial matters but will also ensure that all aspects of a missions operations – from building maintenance to customer service - are all in order” the Foreign Minister explained.

He added that each mission will also be given annual targets for their political, economic and consular activities and these targets would be strictly and regularly reviewed and monitored. 

Minister Samaraweera noted that as Sri Lanka expands its ties with countries, investors and organisations around the world, the Foreign Ministry will have to both improve the quantity and quality of its work. 

“When this government came into power, both quantity and quality were in a state of crisis.  The Foreign Ministry had over 100 officers missing from its 264 cadre. The Foreign Ministry exam was not held regularly. Within six months of office, we recruited 25 new officers on the basis of open competitive examination. We have 67 missions abroad, which means that even if we have no one at the Foreign Ministry that is just four officers per embassy,” he explained. 

The Foreign Minsiter said that there were currently just over 70 officers at the Republic Building in Colombo, which meant that for every officer serving in the home station, the Ministry had three serving in missions abroad. 

“This is far from best practice: for example Singapore has an equal number of officers abroad and at home. To summarise, the Foreign Service cadre isn’t large enough and it is still only two-thirds full,” said Minister Samaraweera. 

Highlighting the importance of supporting the Government mandate to create one million jobs within five years by increasing investment and boosting exports Minister said the Foreign Ministry has an moderate role to play. “It is now the responsibility of the government and this House to make that vision a reality. The Prime Minister’s Economic Policy Statement delivered here on November 5th last year, as promised, outlined more detailed plans to boost investments, exports and growth so that Sri Lanka could meet this target by 2020,” he said.