35 Facts About Anil Moonesinghe

Anil Moonesinghe was a Sri Lankan Trotskyist revolutionary politician and trade unionist.

Anil Moonesinghe became a member of parliament, a Cabinet Minister of Transport in 1964, the Deputy Speaker of Parliament from 1994 to 2000 and a diplomat.

Anil Moonesinghe has authored several books and edited newspapers and magazines.

Anil Moonesinghe was chairman and general manager of a State corporation.

Anil Moonesinghe attended Royal College, Colombo, an elite institution known for producing many radicals, civil servants and bourgeois politicians, where he excelled in athletics and earned his colors.

Anil Moonesinghe went on to University College Ceylon, where he excelled in athletics.

Anil Moonesinghe represented his university at the All India Universities Athletic Meet held in Lahore in 1944, an event held regularly during that time.

Anil Moonesinghe briefly taught at Royal Primary School, which had been relocated to Glendale Bungalow, Bandarawela.

Anil Moonesinghe was awarded an exhibition to the University of London and traveled to Britain in 1945 aboard a troopship.

Anil Moonesinghe interacted with figures like Jock Haston and Ted Grant.

Anil Moonesinghe married Jeanne Hoban in 1948, and together they moved into a houseboat named 'Red October' that they constructed themselves, located on the Thames near Marlow.

Anil Moonesinghe became a speaker for the National Council of Labour Colleges, while Jeanne was elected to the Executive of the Labour Leagues of Youth and later placed on the list of Labour Parliamentary candidates.

In 1952, Anil Moonesinghe was urgently summoned back to Colombo by his parents.

Anil Moonesinghe's efforts were so successful that the Agalawatte branch of the LSSP requested him as the party's parliamentary candidate for the constituency.

Anil Moonesinghe successfully contested the working-class Dematagoda Ward of the Colombo Municipal Council.

Anil Moonesinghe was elected to the Central Committee of the LSSP and then onto its Political Bureau, a position he never lost until he left the party.

Anil Moonesinghe received the portfolio of Communications and set to work to build up the country's transport resources.

Anil Moonesinghe established Employees' Councils to help run the Ceylon Government Railway and the Ceylon Transport Board.

Anil Moonesinghe obtained a large parcel of land in the centre of Colombo for establishing a Central Bus Station in close proximity to the main Fort Railway Station.

Anil Moonesinghe negotiated an agreement with the FIAT company to build buses in Sri Lanka.

Anil Moonesinghe was editor of the daily Janadina newspaper for a short while around this time.

Anil Moonesinghe visited Czechoslovakia during the 'Prague Spring' and was again impressed by the activities of the Workers' Councils there.

Anil Moonesinghe later wrote a book condemning the Soviet invasion which ousted Alexander Dubcek.

Anil Moonesinghe set about organising the United Corporations and Mercantile Union which brought together workers in government corporations, and of which he was general secretary.

Anil Moonesinghe went around the country from factory to factory and built up a union of several tens of thousands of members.

Senior citizens still nostalgically refer to the CTB under Anil Moonesinghe, which provided an efficient and disciplined service to the public.

Anil Moonesinghe took measures to build up local industry and the CTB became well equipped with foundries and workshops: the Central Workshop at Werahera became the largest in South Asia.

Anil Moonesinghe was briefly employed at this time, by the Government of Guyana, as a consultant on transport.

Anil Moonesinghe contested the 1977 election for the Matugama constituency, which lay next to Agalawatte.

Anil Moonesinghe was narrowly beaten into third place by the sitting member of the SLFP.

Anil Moonesinghe became deputy secretary of the LSSP in 1978, having supported the group led by NM Perera at that year's conference.

Anil Moonesinghe supported Hector Kobbekaduwa at the Presidential Election of that year.

Anil Moonesinghe was disoriented by the rather Byzantine internal politics of the SLFP.

Anil Moonesinghe had a close relationship with Vaclav Havel, the president of the Czech Republic, due to his connections with the oppositional movement in Czechoslovakia since the Prague Spring.

Anil Moonesinghe left four children, Janaki, Vinod, Previn and Priyanka, the last two by a second marriage to Joan de Zilva.