By Dwayne Ferreira.
Kamzy Gunaratnam, a Sri Lankan-born Labour MP and former refugee, has been appointed Norway’s transport minister in a major Cabinet reshuffle.
OSLO – Kamzy Gunaratnam, who arrived in Norway as a three-year-old refugee from Sri Lanka’s civil war, has been appointed the country’s transport minister, taking charge of roads, railways, aviation and sea transport.
Gunaratnam, 38, a Labour Party member of Parliament from Oslo, received the appointment at a Cabinet meeting on Sept. 11 and took office at noon that day.
She succeeds Jon-Ivar Nygård, who had led the ministry since October 2021. The change formed part of a wider reshuffle by Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, which also brought Eileen Fugelsnes and Torgeir Micaelsen into the government.
Kamzy Gunaratnam Takes Charge of Key Transport Portfolio
Announcing the appointment, Støre said Gunaratnam had handled previous assignments with political skill and responsibility. She will now oversee the roads, railways, public transport, aviation and sea transport that hold Norway together.
He said she would serve the whole country and noted that she had grown up in both northern and southern Norway.
However, the appointment has also drawn criticism. Gunaratnam does not hold a driving licence and travels by public transport. That makes her the second Norwegian transport minister in recent decades without one, after Odd Einar Dørum in 1997.
Commentators have also pointed to her limited experience in the field. She spent 11 months on Parliament’s transport committee and has never served as a minister or state secretary. Politicians in western Norway have said they fear an Oslo-based minister could deprioritise projects in their region.
The ministry she inherits administers more than 100 billion kroner annually and oversees the state companies Bane NOR, Vy, Avinor and Norske Tog. It is also dealing with repeated rail stoppages and a cost overrun running into billions of kroner at the Moss station project.
From Jaffna Refugee to Norwegian Cabinet Minister
Kamzy Gunaratnam was born Khamshajiny Gunaratnam in Jaffna, northern Sri Lanka, in March 1988. Her family fled the civil war and arrived in Norway in 1991.
They first settled in Hammerfest in the far north before moving to Oslo, where she grew up in the Groruddalen district.
She spent 14 years on the Oslo City Council, including six years as deputy mayor from 2015 to 2021. She has represented Oslo in Parliament since 2021 and had served as first vice-chair of the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications since October last year. She was re-elected in 2025.
Kamzy Gunaratnam has also spoken publicly about the war she fled. Addressing Parliament in February, she recalled being born in a country at war and described her mother taking shelter while pregnant when air-raid sirens sounded.
She also raised the discovery of human remains at Chemmani in Jaffna and the unresolved question of wartime disappearances.
