Parliamentary elections in Sri Lanka follow the September selection of a new president and are expected to put the country on a new course. What might that look like? Sarrah Sammoon, CIPE’s field coordinator in the country, joins Regional Director John Morrell to exchange insights on the economic and political situation in Sri Lanka leading up to the November 14 elections, including the role of the private sector and the Women’s Chamber of Commerce under a new government.
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Transcript
Announcer (00:00):
Democracy that Delivers is brought to you by the Center for International Private Enterprise. Now, to your host.
John Morrell (00:09):
This is the Democracy that Delivers Podcast, brought to you by the Center for International Private Enterprise. This is John Morrell, the regional director for Asia Pacific at CIPE. Today’s episode is with an old friend of mine personally and an old friend of CIPE, Sarrah Sammoon. Sarrah is CIPE’s country representative out of Sri Lanka. But she’s worked with CIPE now for almost a decade. Sarrah has a background with the Sri Lankan Women’s Chamber of Commerce, that’s how CIPE first met Sarrah. We’re thrilled to have Sarrah now on our team.
(00:44):
Sri Lanka is a country going through, well, it’s going through an interesting stretch of time right now, with the election that just took place on September 21st, the upcoming parliamentary elections in November. There’s been a change in government. There’s been a lot going on in Sri Lanka.
(01:01):
But one thing to know about Sarrah, before we start talking Sri Lankan politics. Sarrah’s background actually is in business. She’s a business owner. She and her husband actually own and run a series of businesses. When Sarrah’s talking about the Sri Lankan economy, she’s not doing it from the perspective of a journalist or a think tank. The Sri Lankan economy is something that she’s studied. The Sri Lankan economy is something that she navigates on a daily basis. That’s Sarrah’s background. It’s why we’re so thrilled to have her with CIPE on the CIPE team, and that’s why we’re so thrilled to have her today to talk to us about the election in Sri Lanka, Sri Lankan politics.
(01:39):
Sarrah, thank you so much for being here.
Sarrah Sammoon (01:41):
Thank you so much for inviting me, John. It’s a pleasure always to come back to the CIPE office in DC.
John Morrell (01:47):
Just before we start talking politics, maybe just so that people get a sense of your background and have a frame of reference of what you’re talking about, what kind of businesses do you run?
Sarrah Sammoon (01:57):
Right. I’ve been an entrepreneur for almost 32 years now. I actually started my career in DC, in immigration and compliance. But I moved back to Sri Lanka because, as you mentioned, my husband is a fifth generation gem dealer, so into exports.
John Morrell (02:11):
Gems?
Sarrah Sammoon (02:12):
Yes, sapphires because we’re a source country.
John Morrell (02:15):
Yeah.
Sarrah Sammoon (02:15):
We export. Like I said, it’s a family business, so I’m also a partner. I’m also a gemologist, just because I needed to be a gemologist to be in that family. We export gemstones. But other than that, my full-time is with another company, which is in the same group, which we do global mobility, and immigration, and compliance for market entry. I’m always navigating bureaucracy, and making sure that multinationals coming in and going out of the country, creating markets overseas, or incoming into Sri Lanka are done in compliance with regulations. That’s most of my time.
(02:53):
When I’m not doing that is when I’m working on democracy to make things easy for us business people.
John Morrell (03:01):
We’re thrilled to have you. Just to dive right in, we have a run time of only about 30 minutes, so let’s dive right in. Sri Lanka was in the news quite a bit in the United States a few years ago, when there was all of the social unrest, social upheaval. The executive mansion was raided by a mob. Or by protesters. There was the Rajapaksa government fell. Since that time, the government, Sri Lanka has elected the first-ever what you’d call a Marxist government. The Marxist, that’s what they call themselves, the political party that won the election in September.
(03:42):
Could you get us up to speed on your thoughts of the election, and what people are saying now about President AKD?
Sarrah Sammoon (03:51):
Yeah, John. It’s a very exciting time to be in Sri Lanka. The community, I’m based in the Western province so we do business around the country. In 2022, as you know, the world saw what we said was pretty much a peaceful protest, where President Gotabaya Rajapaksa basically had to resign. The president at the time, then Ranil Wickremesinghe, who was a previous prime minister who had only one seat in Parliament was given the position because nobody else wanted to take the position. He came. We had, if you remember, queues of people looking for gas, no electricity.
John Morrell (04:29):
Yeah.
Sarrah Sammoon (04:29):
He, in the short term, solved that problem. We had food on the table again, we had our power back up. We could cook, we had our gas. The queues reduced. It also felt like he never really … It’s traditional politics, where the Rajapaksas, Mr. Wickremesinghe, they all come from political backgrounds. Families and generations in the business.
(04:57):
However, even though we got our gas, people expected change. Because back in 2022, people expected good governance, which we did not get. Then came the protests, the 2019 Easter attacks. Then came the whole COVID, and then the protest. But nothing really changed, in terms of good governance and anti-corruption.
(05:21):
Even in our community, which was very much pro the other parties, the other two main parties, which was SLPP and SJG, which had not come into power. They really thought, “Okay, Ranil Wickremesinghe has a chance this time.” Though his party was broken down. But by early this year, the JVP, which is a Communist party, I have experienced it, people were really scared of them. Because back in ’89, I lived through that as well. There was a lot of violence.
John Morrell (05:57):
They used to blow things up from time to time.
Sarrah Sammoon (05:58):
Kill people. I’ve personally experienced, my neighbors, horrific stories which I won’t go into on the podcast. I would say it’s not that we have not experienced violence from the other party members, it’s just I think the business community experienced it firsthand more from the JVP.
(06:20):
But in 2019, around that time, and please forgive me, I’m here and there on the year, but the JVP collaborated with the National People’s Power. It was a new collaboration where they got professionals to come in. They started changing the narrative of the JVP. Then the JVP, Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, became the National People’s Power, NPP. But people were like, “Yeah, yeah, it is the NPP, but it is still the JVP. It is still the Communist, violent party.”
(06:54):
But the current president, who I myself and my community knew, oh my God, it’s their time that they’re going to come into power because people were so fed up of the old politics, the corruption, that nothing changing. That they were just like, “Okay, we need to get rid of these 225 old style politicians of Parliament. We need to give these guys a chance.” Because they started changing their narrative since 2019.
(07:24):
AKD, Anura Kumara Dissanayake, he brought in people who were professionals, people who spoke, what do they say, the capitalist democratic language. They started changing the narrative. But if we spoke to the common man, if I spoke to the gardener, to the farmers, they were so fed up. They just wanted food on the table. They wanted to be heard. Which they felt they were not getting.
(07:49):
But the JVP has had time to prepare since 2019. They started, like I said, changing the narrative. They apologized for their violence past and the insurgencies. They said, “We are letting go of that. That is not us anymore. We are going to show you by behavior.” This is the narrative they were building up. Then they started talking about they had so much time to prepare.
(08:13):
When they, in 2019, they only had 3% of seats. They’ve never been in power except for 3% of seats in the Parliament. Interestingly, when September 21st came, people already had a feeling it’s a very, very close call between AKD and President Premadasa’s son. He was assassinated years ago, but his son, Sajith Premadasa, who has also never been elected. The fight was between the two of them.
(08:49):
President Ranil ran on a gas cylinder symbol for the elections to remind them, “Hey, I’m the one who gave you the gas, and I’m the one who can discuss with the IMF. The JVP is going to come in, which they’re calling themself the NPP.” They kept reminding us what they did back then. That they’re not going to be able to talk to the IMF, “It’s not like we’re out of the woods right now with our debt. They don’t have foreign relations. If you have two cars, they’re going to take away your cars,” the fear.
(09:20):
Even our business community, there was two sides. They could see through that this narrative is changing. And also, people felt really strong like, “We have a voice now. We voted out President Gotabaya.”
John Morrell (09:36):
The old guard over the outfield.
Sarrah Sammoon (09:36):
The old guard, yeah.
John Morrell (09:37):
The old guard, yeah.
Sarrah Sammoon (09:40):
Not even voted out, we got him to resign with a protest. We can vote them out and we can hold them accountable now. It had changed, it had shifted, the mindset even with the business community had shifted.
(09:53):
There was so much in deals. As a business person, we always … I’m in compliance. It would be really hard for us, because every time we went to do get a tender or something, somebody who knew somebody, or I’m not going to say it out loud, but there’s always a kickback. It was really hard for us to get into if we were not willing to play that playing field. There was a lot of change even in the business community. “We’ve had enough, we can’t get any worse. Let’s give a new set of people a chance this time.”
John Morrell (10:28):
With your background, not only background, your current profession in business, what is the business community thinking about the NPP government? Because you’ve used the term a few times, narrative. That the narrative on the JVP had been, frankly, borderline terrorists. They were associated with violence. Whereas they’ve tried, and apparently successfully, they’re winning elections now, to rehabilitate their image, and to have new narratives. That the JVP was in the past, it’s the NPP now. But business community, what do they think? Are they afraid, are they optimistic?
Sarrah Sammoon (11:05):
Now there’s even a further shift because he’s our president. He became our president September 21st. Now we know we have to work with this president. The business community understands, okay, there’s no choice. This is our president and he’s all our president, and we have to work with them.
(11:24):
The thing is the way had post election, there was absolutely no violence. Then the usual, we have what we call milk rice, and we have crackers when the parties win. There was none of that. I was listening to one of the upcoming, very popular, I would say a future probable minister, but he’s on the executive committee and handles the economic front, that they had a Zoom call, and they spoke to all their party members. They said, “Look, if we win,” because they were sure that they were going to win. “If we win, you need to make sure there’s absolutely no violence. You don’t celebrate by having milk rice on the streets, which our usual tradition is to do. No crackers, nothing.”
(12:12):
When they came to take oath, it was 20 minutes. They didn’t even serve a coffee, or a drink, or anything like that. President AKD was just rolled up sleeves when he comes out. They really showed a difference. He appointed, as his Prime Minister, Dr. Harini Amarasuriya, a female who had no political affiliations from family members, who is very well-educated, who could speak to the business-
John Morrell (12:36):
What is her background?
Sarrah Sammoon (12:36):
Forgive me, I don’t know her background exactly. I’ll have to check that one up. She was educated in the UK, if I’m not mistaken. She’s very well-known and respected in the academic field. But everyone was like, “Wow. She’s not going to be a yes person.”
John Morrell (12:53):
In other words, a very credible prime minister.
Sarrah Sammoon (12:54):
Credible, and not a yes person. This is somebody who will hold President AKD accountable. That was what we knew of her. We were like, “Oh, okay. That’s who they appointed?”
(13:06):
Because there’s another person who’s handling foreign affairs, Minister Vijitha Herath. Because they only had a few members in Parliament and they’re running the country right now with those few members, who is much more senior in the party. But they started doing appointments of people who were credible, who had experience in the industry, and they had nothing to do with-
John Morrell (13:27):
Technocrats. Technocrats.
Sarrah Sammoon (13:29):
Yeah, completely.
John Morrell (13:29):
Experts.
Sarrah Sammoon (13:29):
Completely. We were like, “Okay.” The business community is like, “You know what, this seems like” because they have the general election coming.
(13:35):
They’re not asking for two-thirds of the majority. They’re asking for a clear number that’ll help them govern properly, that they can make decisions. Because if they had, from the way they got 42%, they would have got 105 seats out of 225. But they need about 130. Not two-thirds they’re asking, because they’re a party that always were against the two-third majority because then the accountability is less. They’re asking for lesser, but a strong government that can make decisions. Yeah.
(14:04):
The business community is actually opening their eyes. And they’re reaching out, they’re talking. They’re listening. They’re just showing up and they’re answering questions. They’re also-
John Morrell (14:16):
They being the government?
Sarrah Sammoon (14:16):
The president’s party.
John Morrell (14:18):
Okay.
Sarrah Sammoon (14:18):
It’s very interesting that they are also not very self-focused. When they come in, if they have [inaudible 00:14:27], they’ve just given their nominations whose going to be running for the elections. They’re bringing their teammates, which we’ve never seen before, John. People would be very selfish, about them. Now they’re like, “What will you believe in?” They ask the questions that you want, “We’re listening.” They have a policy handbook. I’ve really never, as a business person, never looked a manifestos before properly because there’s a manifesto and nobody does anything by the book. But these guys are actually following their policy handbook. They’re looking at tourism, agriculture, IT. They’re looking at exports.
(15:04):
They’re moving away … I have not heard the word communism and Marxism. I think I had a conversation with somebody from DC as soon as they came because all the news was like, “Marxist, Communist government in power.” They’re saying they’ve evolved. They’re saying the JVP and NPP, they’re openly saying they have the same goals now. They’re not disregarding that they’re no longer the JVP. They’re like, “We are still the JVP and the NPP together.”
John Morrell (15:29):
Do their political opponents though use those terms?
Sarrah Sammoon (15:32):
They do.
John Morrell (15:32):
As insults? They’re Communists, and Marxists.
Sarrah Sammoon (15:35):
Of course. It’s still fear tactics a lot being used. But they’re following this policy book which they’ve put out there and they’re sticking to it.
John Morrell (15:42):
Interesting. You mentioned the IMF and the debt. You said the country’s still not out of the woods yet. What was one of the many interesting things behind the protests that brought down the Rajapaksa government was that, at least initially, a lot of the public frustration was with the government’s finances. That the government had misused public finances, and the government was in debt, and didn’t even really know how much they were in debt, and couldn’t service the debt. What is the latest on that? The latest on the IMF negotiations? Because the IMF bailout is … Because you said the country’s still not out of the woods yet. Is it something that is still in the news? Do people still talk about it? Or is the public finances faded in interest?
Sarrah Sammoon (16:34):
No, very much it is in the news. That was one of the things the business community was watching. As soon as they came into power, are they able to have that conversation with the IMF? They have successfully done that. The IMF is negotiating with them. They were very clear that they may change the IMF program, but they actually are now stepping back and saying, “We’ve understood what the IMF is saying, so we’re meeting them halfway.” I don’t know the economics aspects behind the actual agreement, but they’ve successfully negotiated with the IMF.
(17:05):
That’s a huge surprise as well, for a lot of the business community. Because that was the narrative that was being given, that-
John Morrell (17:11):
That they’re radical.
Sarrah Sammoon (17:12):
They’re radical.
John Morrell (17:13):
And that they’ll mess up the finances, and everything.
Sarrah Sammoon (17:14):
Exactly. They don’t have the experience, they’re new. The main thing was we cannot fail. We can’t afford for a new government to come in that has no experience running a country at this point. But actually, so far, they have been very successful with the IMF negotiations.
John Morrell (17:36):
Yeah. You’re painting a picture of a credible technocratic government. Obviously, they have their ideology, but these aren’t radicals who are going to come in upset the apple cart. They’re looking to make things work.
Sarrah Sammoon (17:53):
Exactly. They prefer to be saying that they’re more a leftist party. That’s what they prefer to be known as now.
John Morrell (18:02):
There’s a constituency for that. There’s nothing wrong with that at all. How does this impact Sri Lanka’s foreign relations? Because Sri Lanka, it’s an emerging market, but it’s a major emerging market. Tremendously geopolitically significant. It’s a small country that is actively courted by China, India, the United States. And often times, Sri Lanka, I know feels as though it’s being pulled in different directions. India, the United States, China, these are massive countries, massive economies. Sri Lanka needs to make sure it’s not being bullied, it’s not being taken advantage of. The sort of concerns that any major emerging market would feel.
(18:48):
But with the new government, the NPP government, what is the assessment of what their foreign policy will be like? Will they be pro-Western, pro-India? What are people saying?
Sarrah Sammoon (18:58):
They’ve been very clear on that note, that this is our policy. We want to improve our FDIs, we want to export more. There needs to be equity. “We want the rich to get richer, but we don’t want the poor to get poorer.” That is what President AKD, that’s his line. One of his lines.
(19:21):
One of the early, for the business community, where we starting noticing as a business community, “Hey, is there a chance that President AKD’s party is going to come into power?” It was long before the election was over, the last one year. He visited New York. He was invited by India. He was the only party leader that was invited from all the other parties. These were indications to us that they had insights that there is a strong on-ground support for their party.
(19:53):
They are very clear that this is our agenda. We are building our institutes. They’re going on a completely anti-corruption policy. They’ve already submitted seven cases, which has been over the years, for stolen assets in the country. They’re going towards that. Even in the government, the amount of funds that have been wasted, they keep highlighting that. It’s just there, we knew it as well, it’s there. Now they’re actually doing something about it.
Sarrah Sammoon (20:35):
So when it comes to foreign policy, we will work with anyone is what the narrative we are hearing from them. But it is our agenda. It has to benefit us. They really want to be like the next India, the next Vietnam, next South Korea because they’re like, “If they can do it, why can’t we do it?” And that’s what they’re looking at. So they keep talking about India, Vietnam, South Korea and their economies and that’s what they, they’re like even some of the policies look. So we’ve been advocating with them because there is also a platform. I was at the advocacy hill at Capitol Hill on Tuesday because I came for a conference here on the Global Workforce Symposium. I was actually speaking on the privilege and passports and how to navigate global mobility and there was such an easy way to lobby.
(21:23):
Now we don’t have a lobbying policy where there’s people that we can hire as lobbyists in Sri Lanka. It’s something that we need to introduce. Now even for me to share that would’ve been very difficult before because I would’ve had to call somebody who I knew to get a meeting, then I’ll send a letter, but here they have committees that you could just email them and there’s actually a response. I was like-
John Morrell (21:45):
Can I ask you a question about that-
Sarrah Sammoon (21:45):
Sure.
John Morrell (21:46):
Because that’s something I think that a lot of people in the United States take for granted, that you can go into the Capitol. You have to go through metal detectors, a bit like getting into an airport, but it’s a public building. You can go in, you can visit your member of Congress. It’s accessible. Doesn’t necessarily work perfectly, but it’s nothing if it’s not accessible. In Sri Lanka you’re saying that it doesn’t work that way. You can’t just go see your member of Parliament and you can’t go attend hearings. You have to be connected and you have to be invited and things like that. Is that what you’re saying?
Sarrah Sammoon (22:18):
So the parliamentary members, maybe I can, I’m talking from my experience, the parliamentary members do have public days, but it’s not timed. We’re business people. We can’t have a meeting at nine o’clock and only be seen at three o’clock and you don’t even know whether your member of Parliament is actually going to show up at the meeting. And even if he’s there, he’s not really listening to you and is it just a meeting?
(22:41):
So it’s not documented. It’s not an easy transparent process. I mean, I’m part of the Women’s Chamber. When we advocate, we go to our ministers, we ask for a meeting, but is there a follow-up system? We have to chase it. We’ve done it. We’ve done it with site where we’ve worked towards a budget, but it’s a lot of work. It is not a documented, transparent process. So there’s a lot of, yes, if we know somebody, the door is easier to open, but that culture is changing and we can already see that shift. I mean, for us it’s hope.
John Morrell (23:15):
Interesting.
Sarrah Sammoon (23:15):
Yeah.
John Morrell (23:16):
What is new at the Women’s Chamber? The issues, because I imagine that the Women’s Chamber is viewing this new administration as a potential ally and certainly they would want the administration to be an ally. What are the priorities now out of the Chamber? What’s the new news out of the Sri Lankan Women’s Chamber?
Sarrah Sammoon (23:35):
So the Women’s Chamber of Industry and Commerce Sri Lanka, which we call WCIC as you know, we completely stay away from politics as affiliating. So we don’t usually attend political events-
John Morrell (23:48):
You don’t endorse candidates-
Sarrah Sammoon (23:52):
We don’t endorse candidates at all.
John Morrell (23:52):
But you have issue priorities? You have issues-
Sarrah Sammoon (23:52):
100%. Yeah. So we do attend and advocate meetings. Like we’re having a meeting when we get back as well on the seventh. So we have a new board and Gayani de Alwis is our new chairperson and I’m back on the board again and hoping to set up the Women’s Business Resource Center for Sri Lanka. But we are very vocal as a chamber. When there are issues that are affecting our members and our entrepreneurs, we actually speak out. Our advocacy unit puts it out and speaks up. We tie up with the other chambers like Ceylon Chamber of Commerce and the other chambers and we give a united voice about issues and we raise it.
(24:28):
So right now it’s our new year. We just started in September just before the elections the new board. So we’re hoping, we have to wait for the elections. It’s just pretty much like the US. We’re waiting now for the 14th of November and seeing whether they are going to have the seats that they need in order to govern properly. One of the things they’ve said is they’re not going to take people from other parties that have been associated with corruption or anything like that. They will run within whatever they get.
John Morrell (24:58):
So they won’t take crossovers.
Sarrah Sammoon (25:00):
They won’t take crossovers unless, I mean they might if it’s a very good credible, but their policy is not to. Yeah.
John Morrell (25:06):
Interesting.
Sarrah Sammoon (25:07):
So back to the Women’s Chamber. So we’re just coming up with the new strategy. So we have a strategy meeting as soon as we get back what we’re going to be doing for the new year. But we’re excited. But one interesting thing, John, is this is the first time there’s a massive number of women running for elections, we have never seen, and they’re coming out of the MPP. So-
John Morrell (25:26):
Interesting.
Sarrah Sammoon (25:26):
That’s real interesting for us because before it was always family members or somebody’s wife who’s going into politics. Honestly in my experience, we’ve never really seen our female parliamentary members really actively support the women business people in Sri Lanka. But we’re seeing the shift with MPP.
John Morrell (25:49):
And I have no doubt that the Women’s Chamber is a big part behind that culture shift of normalizing seeing women’s faces, women’s names, associated with business issues. Women business owners pay taxes and tariffs just like businesses owned by men. And so the fact that the Women’s Chamber normalizes women’s leadership and business issues, I have no doubt that the Women’s Chamber is a big part behind that changing culture that women can run for office and it’s exciting.
Sarrah Sammoon (26:24):
I mean, we’ve come a long way. So it’s our 40th anniversary in March next year.
John Morrell (26:29):
Congratulations.
Sarrah Sammoon (26:30):
So yeah. So we’re really excited and we’ve really evolved. I mean, we have a seat in many places now where we never had a seat and a voice before. Yeah. And also, the Women’s Chamber is now, we just changed our constitution so we can now have regional chapter, because we were based in Colombo and we’d have partners across the country, but now we can open our own chapters as well. Yeah. So I also do want to say here, I am not politically affiliated at all and I almost sound I think with everything I’m saying like I’m a huge fan of MPP. I’m not. But for the first time in a long time, I had been so disillusioned over the last few years as a business community and being part, the way they do their tenders, the corruption in that.
John Morrell (27:13):
So how they award government contracts-
Sarrah Sammoon (27:15):
Exactly. For the first time I feel like, “Okay. We don’t need to know anybody. There is this transparent system. We are actually being heard,” and they’re doing it by behavior. So I have hope, a new hope, and I think that’s what a lot of the business community I’m around is seeing and they’re almost saying like, “We should vote for them because we should give them the ability to govern properly without giving them a-
John Morrell (27:38):
Give them a shot.
Sarrah Sammoon (27:39):
To give them a strong parliament. Yeah.
John Morrell (27:42):
Well that’s a good segue to the last question I’m going to ask before we wrap things up. What comes next, Sarrah, out of Sri Lanka? What should the outside world expect from either the Sri Lankan economy, Sri Lankan politics? I know you have a crystal ball in your handbag no doubt, but if you could peer into that crystal ball, Sarrah, what comes next? What should the world expect out of Sri Lanka in the near future?
Sarrah Sammoon (28:09):
Is to give us a chance. To hear, because, like I said, the news that came out as soon as President AKD came out was like Leftist Communist party coming into the, which scares people.
John Morrell (28:24):
That was the headline.
Sarrah Sammoon (28:25):
Yes. Exactly. But to give the new government a chance to give Sri Lanka a chance because we have so much opportunity and we almost keep shooting ourselves in the foot over the last few years and we feel there’s now an actual political culture change. Recently there was a security threat. They were very quick to act on it. The US government, the Australian government, they all came out and gave warnings, but the government was very quick to act on it and collaborate and everything is safe. It’s safe to come to Sri Lanka. So we think we need time because we are in an economic crisis anyway, but everything is stable. To give us a chance and we’d like to see more of people willing to come and invest in Sri Lanka, be part of Sri Lanka. Like you said, we are a fantastic geographical location.
John Morrell (29:24):
Colombo is one of the nicest cities I’ve visited. And so Sri Lanka has a great deal to offer, not just as a destination for investment, but just as tourists, Americans, Indians, Australians, Southeast, Asians. Go to Colombo. You won’t be disappointed.
Sarrah Sammoon (29:41):
Yeah. And the beauty of Sri Lanka is the rest of the country as well.
John Morrell (29:44):
I have-
Sarrah Sammoon (29:44):
But you have to-
John Morrell (29:47):
I have no doubt.
Sarrah Sammoon (29:47):
You have to come, John.
John Morrell (29:47):
I’ve been to Colombo. I’ve been to Colombo, but I haven’t gotten outside of town yet.
Sarrah Sammoon (29:50):
Yeah.
John Morrell (29:51):
Sarrah Sammoon, thank you so much for doing this. One last quick reminder, what are your gem business and also your consultancy? What are the names of those companies again so people can look them up?
Sarrah Sammoon (30:02):
So the group is called Sapphire Capital Group and Sapphire Carters Ware Exporters is the gem company and my company is called Magellan Champlain. It’s MC.
John Morrell (30:10):
And the Women’s Chamber, what is the website that people could visit?
Sarrah Sammoon (30:14):
Yes. Wcicsl.lk. Our majority population is women in Sri Lanka and SMEs are also actually more women in Sri Lanka than there are males. Yeah. So please.
John Morrell (30:31):
Well the Women’s Chamber of Sri Lanka is lucky to have you, Sarrah, as are we at CIPE. Thank you so much for your time and we look forward to talking again soon. Thanks, Sarrah.
Sarrah Sammoon (30:40):
Thank you so much for having me.
Announcer (30:42):
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Published Date: November 13, 2024