The decision of the National Peoples’ Power (NPP) to present Ms. Vraîe Cally Balthazaar, a Burgher, for the Mayoralty of Colombo, and get her elected, signifies the party’s makeover as one aiming to represent all major communities of Sri Lanka, including the tiniest – the Burghers.
By choosing a Burgher, the NPP has also recognised (if only inadvertently) the role of the Burghers in the making of Colombo city as well as the Colombo Municipal Council (CMC).
Though Ms.Balthazaar’s case is an exception now, several prominent Burghers had been CMC’s founder-members in 1865. Charles Ambrose Lorensz was among the first to be elected to the CMC. Lorensz had prepared lists of resident householders in Colombo and also persons eligible for the office of Councillors.
Deloraine Brohier says in a piece in the Sri Lanka Genealogy website, that Sir Richard Morgan had noted that six of those elected to the Council were Burghers, which led him to remark, “There are too many lawyers and too many Burghers!”
Of those elected to the first CMC were – C. L. Ferdinands (Colpetty), Dr. J. W. Van Geyzel (Pettah), C. A. Lorensz (Kotahena) and F. C. Loos (Maradana). Samuel Grenier was Secretary when the Council met for the first time, on January 16, 1866. In 1937, Dr. Vivian R. Schokman was elected Mayor.
And as in the CMC, in the other major Town Councils also (in Kandy and Galle) leading Burghers played an active role. Dr. Peter Daniel Anthonisz served in the Galle Municipal Council, and by the special permission of the Governor, was also a member of the CMC and represented the Burgher community in the Legislative Council from 1886 to 1895.
The Burghers may have avoided politics in post-independence Ceylon, and had been more keen on looking for fresher pastures in the UK and Australia, but they were key participants in politics and administration during Dutch and British rule.
Although the British had taken over Ceylon from the Dutch in 1796, they did not administer it as a separate entity like the Dutch did. Ceylon was placed under the Governor of Madras and was administered by Madras officials. But the methods of the Madras officials were different from those of the Dutch. The Burghers, who were key functionaries under the Dutch, felt ill at ease and protested through non-cooperation, along with other affected communities.
However, it did not take long for the British to conclude that Ceylon should be administered separately as a “Crown Colony”. Thus, the Burghers had a key role in unhinging Ceylon from the yoke of Madras and the Indian subcontinent. Separation from India allowed Ceylon to chart its own political, social and economic path which gave it an unique personality that was safeguarded zealously by generations of Ceylonese political leaders.
The Burghers under the Dutch and the British, were the bridge between the European ruler and the indigenous Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims. As a people of European origin and of mixed descent, the Burghers could perform this role like no others could. In turn, they enjoyed a privileged position.
But even as they were the steel frame of the British administration, the Burghers displayed gumption in opposing the unjust actions of the British rulrs. As J.B. Muller writes, they were the first voices for internal self-Government, other popular causes, and subsequently, for full independence. But their agitations were conducted with “decorum, decently without breaking the Law that then prevailed,” as Muller puts it.
C.A.Lorensz
The first Burgher to enter Ceylonese politics was J.H. Hillebrand. He was followed by J. B. Giffenin. The Burgher intelligentsia of the 1860s was led by a young man who hailed from Matara – Charles Ambrose Lorensz (1829-1871). A brilliant lawyer he was popularly known as the “Morning Star of Hulftsdorp”. Together with a group of young Burghers such as Leopold Ludovici, Francis Bevan, Samuel Grenier and James Stewart Drieberg, Lorensz produced a local literary journal called Young Ceylon.
In 1859 Lorensz and along with others purchased the Ceylon Examiner which became the first Ceylonese newspaper. Until his death in 1871, at the age of 42, Lorensz wielded his powerful pen for social reform, championing democratic causes and courageously criticising the Governor and his Executive Council.
He was a Burger non-official member of the Legislative Council of Ceylon from 1856 to 1864. He was also the first non-official member to claim and receive the right of introducing a Private Bill. He played a major role in the establishment of the Colombo Municipal Council, the first Municipality in the island.
Lorensz is credited with being the architect of the Currency Ordinance which said that Ceylon should switch from the British currency to its own “Rupee”. He also coined the term “Ceylonese”. He played a major role in the reform and development of education, the amendment and codification of the law, and the inauguration of the Ceylon Government Railway (in 1864-65).
George A.H. Wille
George Alfred Henry Wille (1871-1951), another notable Burgher from the legal fraternity, had also entered public life. There was hardly a public movement in the early 20th century in which Wille did not play a part, Deloraine Brohier recalls.
“He was well-known for his knowledge in Constitutional matters. When the Ceylon Congress came into existence, Wille had the sagacity to foresee political reform in Ceylon which could not be postponed. Alone among minority men, George Wille joined the (Ceylon National) Congress founded in 1919 and took a prominent part in its affairs side by side with its foremost leaders from the other communities,” she said.
One of the greatest contributions of George Wille to the public of Ceylon, was in building bridges between the Burghers and the other Ceylonese communities. He was a far-sighted man and was convinced that the Burghers could not remain aloof. He knew intimately and admired the integrity of men such as Sir James Peiris, Sir D. B. Jayatilleke and Sir Ponnambalam Ramanathan.
Even when he was barely twenty-five years old he was a regular contributor to the Ceylon Examiner, the lawyers’ paper. When that paper was discontinued after a half a century’s outstanding existence, Wille turned to the Ceylon Independent, owned by another Burgher, Sir Hector Van Cuylenburg, who had been a Member in the Governor’s Council. The Ceylon Independent, at its zenith, campaigned against the Paddy Tax and won.
A.E. Buultjens
A.E.Buultjens, an outstanding Burgher was a Cambridge graduate who became a Buddhist and the first principal (1890-98) of the leading Buddhist educational institution in the country: Ananda College. Buultjens was also a pioneer of the nascent labour and trade union movement, organising the printers at H. W. Cave & Co., who struck work in 1893.
Pieter Keuneman, a product of Pembroke College, Cambridge, was the only Burgher to be prominent in post-independence Ceylonese politics. He was successively Secretary and President of the Cambridge Union and edited the Union’s learned journal, ‘Granta’. He went on to become a founding member of the United Socialist Party in 1941, which became the Ceylon Communist Party in 1943. He was the Party’s first Secretary-General, President of the CP-led Ceylon Trade Union Federation and was in Parliament continuously from 1947 to 1977 representing the multi-member Colombo Central constituency. He was fluent in both Sinhala and Tamil.
According to J.B.Muller, the Burgher leaders watched with “considerable and growing disquiet” the formation of the first Tamil political party, the All Ceylon Tamil Congress in 1944, and the breakaway faction that became the Federal Party in 1949. They also took serious note of Muslim organisations converting themselves into political parties representing the interests of the Muslims. To the Burghers, ethno-based politics sounded the death-knell of liberal democratic politics in Ceylon.
The Burgher leaders refused to convert the Dutch Burgher Union into a political party, preferring to stay loyal to the Government in power and abiding by the laws of the land.
Muller said that Burgher leaders who shone in the first half of the 20th century, did not do so in the post-independence period. Given the intensification of communal politics in the 1950s, their eyes were focused on greener pastures overseas.
“They failed to provide enlightened leadership to the community and, as a direct result; the Burghers gradually sank into a shadowy obscurity and a debilitating poverty barring a few fortunate exceptions,” Muller said.
However, as the 21st century dawned, the Burghers realised that they must emerge from their obscurity, leave the shackles of poverty behind, and once again claim the natural rights of fully co-equal citizenship, Muller said.
“A new generation of dynamic Burghers has now emerged and is restating in no uncertain terms their right to be seen and heard.”
Vraîe Cally Balthazaar, the first elected Burgher Mayor of Colombo, is the new dawn both for the Burghers and Sri Lanka. She is a representative of the new crop of Burghers which has integrated with the rest of the communities in Sri Lanka and is seeking avenues of growth in a united Sri Lanka.
A BA in Fashion/Apparel Design from Northumbria University, and a Postgraduate Diploma and Master’s in Gender and Women’s Studies from the University of Colombo, Balthazaar is a self-made person who does not lean on her family, unlike other women in Sri Lankan politics who rely family back up.
Balthazaar spent nearly a decade (2005–2014) as a television presenter, especially known for hosting the “Good Morning Sri Lanka” program on MTV. From 2018 she had been active in NGOs and also research focusing on women’s and children’s rights, urban development, and gender and labour equity in underprivileged communities.
A businesswoman too, she is the founder of Cally Products, a social enterprise producing biodegradable and reusable alternatives to single-use plastics.
Political life
Balthazaar joined the Socialist Youth Union (linked to Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna / NPP in 2021. In the 2024 parliamentary elections she ran for a seat in Colombo District, but fell short narrowly. But she won a Municipal Council seat on the May 6, 2025 Local Government elections, representing Thimbirigasyaya. She was nominated by NPP as its Mayoral candidate and was elected Colombo’s Mayor on June 16.
Balthazaar is the second woman Mayor of Colombo and the first Burgher woman to grace the office in the CMC’s 160-year history.
It redounds to the credit of the NPP and also the Opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) that both presented a member from a minority community for the top post. The SJB’s candidate was Riza Zarook.
Clearly, these are signs that Sri Lanka is trying to leave communal and gender politics behind and is looking to chart a new course based on accommodation and harmony.
