(COLOMBO) – The Sri Lanka Customs on Wednesday called off their strike following discussions with the Government easing off a severe backlog of containers that could not be released owing to the trade union action, union officials said.
They said the ‘work to rule or go slow campaign’ had been called off following discussions with the State Minister of Finance Ranjith Siyambalapitiya that ended on a positive note.
However, as there are more matters to be clarified, further discussions will be convened in the coming days and a final decision is expected to be reached by March 31, the officials said.
Accordingly, the operations at the Customs, which were hampered by the trade union action has returned to normalcy from today (Wednesday) and the clearance of containers held up at the Colombo Port has also resumed, they added.
On Friday last week Customs officials including superintendents and staff officers engaged in a trade union action in protest of the Treasury’s decision to bring the Customs Officers Reward Fund under the purview of the Finance Ministry.
President Ranil Wickremesinghe is the country’s Finance Minister.
