Sri Lanka, Jan. 16 -- Sri Lanka is often spoken of as one of the worst affected countries economically from the COVID-19 pandemic. Fitch Ratings last November made it look worse. COVID-19 did affect the economy no doubt with lockdowns and isolations over almost nine months last year and still continuing. But we were no better even before the COVID-19 pandemic. Pre-pandemic Sri Lanka is one major fact that is not brought into discussion when getting "back to normalcy" is spoken about.

"Economists and Financial experts" with high profile designations continue to publicly advise the government on how the economy could be pulled out of the rut. They stress on the need to provide more incentives for "foreign direct investments" (FDI). Need to...