NE District Unions in new Consortium

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 August 2002, 01:56 GMT]
A new organisation, the Consortium of North East Thrift and Credit Co-operative Societies Unions (TCCS) has been formed with its headquarters in Trincomalee. Eight district member unions of the NorthEast province which had been aligned with the Sri Lanka Federation of TCCS Ltd with its headquarters in Colombo became members of the TCCS.

The District Unions of Killinochchi, Mullaitivu, Jaffna, Mannar, Vavuniya, Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Kalmunai ( Ampara ) were admitted as members of the new Consortium at its inaugural meeting held Sunday evening at its offices in Trincomalee.

Mr. K. Selvarajah of Kilinochchi was elected first President of the Consortium. An eight member Board of Directors was also elected.

UNDP field coordinator Ms Clare McConnachie addressing the provincial workshop for the members of the newly formed NE Consortium of TCCS held Monday at Trincomalee district TCCS union office (Photo:TamilNet)

The main purpose of forming an independent consortium for the northeast province is that the Sri Lanka Federation of TCCS has not been in a position to assist the North-East members in their rehabilitation, officials said.

2172 TCCS branches are functioning in the northeast province with more than 85 thousand members.

The Provincial Commissioner of Co-operative Development Department, Mr. A. Subramania Sarma said that the formation of a consortium of this nature should be considered as an important development of the co-operative movement in the NE province.

Provincial Director of Industries Mr. M. Irenius Selvin said that the only goal of this consortium should be to uplift the people of the NE province from poverty.

A two-day provincial workshop for the members of the Consortium began Monday at the office of the Trincomalee district TCCS with Mr. G. Krisuhnamoorthy, Chief Secretary of the North East Provincial Council as the chief guest.

The field co-coordinator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Ms Clare McConnachie also participated in the workshop. Mr. A. Amirthalingam, Provincial Secretary to the Ministry of Rehabilitation, Reconstruction and Women Affairs also spoke at the event.