Thursday 11th June, 2026

The law finally caught up with former Deputy Minister Sarana Gunawardena, who caused losses to the state through some questionable deals, two decades ago. He was found guilty on four counts of corruption charges and sentenced to 16 years of rigorous imprisonment by the Colombo High Court, on Tuesday. The Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) had filed four cases against him for causing losses to the state coffers during his tenure as Chairman of the Development Lotteries Board during the Mahinda Rajapaksa government, in 2006. The CIABOC stated that he had acted in a manner that provided an undue advantage to some individuals when obtaining vehicles on rent for the institution.

When Gunawardena committed those offences, he may not have thought he would have to face the consequences of his actions. He is not alone in having enriched himself at the expense of the public; many are those who have amassed colossal amounts of ill-gotten wealth through corrupt means while in power. It is hoped that all of them will be brought to justice.

The deterrent sentence handed down to Gunawardena must have gladdened the hearts of all those who dream of a country free from bribery and corruption. The economic cost of corruption in Sri Lanka has not been estimated. But corruption has obviously hindered economic progress. The IMF and the World Bank have pointed out that corruption discourages foreign direct investment, increases cost of public infrastructure, reduces efficiency of state-owned enterprises, and weakens competition and productivity. So, a strategy to develop the economy consists in a truly national effort to battle bribery and corruption with might and main.

The CIABOC went all out to bring Gunawardena to justice, and it deserves praise for its relentless efforts. Does this mean that the culture of impunity is over and the rule of law has finally been restored under the present dispensation? The answer is in the negative. Most corruption cases that have culminated in convictions were filed prior to the 2024 regime change.

It is imperative that the CIABOC act swiftly and decisively in the case against former Energy Minister Kumara Jayakody, whom it has indicted on two counts: facilitating a private company to make undue financial profits and causing a loss of over Rs 8.8 million to the state while serving as the procurement manager of the Lanka Fertiliser Company in 2016. The CIABOC has not been entirely free from allegations of selective efficiency in handling corruption cases. Jayakody was not arrested. He obtained bail after indictment.

Over the last year and a half or so, the CIABOC has successfully prosecuted several former ministers. In April 2025, the Colombo High Court sentenced former Chief Minister of the North Central Province S. M. Ranjith Samarakoon and his secretary to 16 years RI for obtaining fuel fraudulently and causing losses to the state. In May 2025, the Colombo High Court Trial-at-Bar sentenced former Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage and former Sathosa Chairman and ex-Minister Nalin Fernando to 20 years RI and 25 years RI, respectively, for causing a loss of Rs. 53 million to the state by using public funds to purchase 14,000 carrom boards and 11,000 checkers boards purportedly for schools and sports clubs in the run-up to the 2015 presidential election.

Perhaps, the severity of the offences, committed by Aluthgamage, Fernando and Ranjith, pales into insignificance in comparison to that of the coal procurement scam, which is believed to have caused staggering losses amounting to Rs. 10 billion to the state coffers. We reported on Monday that the use of diesel to keep the oil-fired power plants running to compensate for the Norochcholai generation loss due to the use of substandard coal had cost Rs. 4.5 billion in April 2026 alone. As we reported on Monday (08), according to power sector data, coal-based electricity generation in April 2026 was 27 GWh lower than in April 2025, a development that has sparked concerns among energy experts and economists over the mounting financial burden of diesel replacement on the country’s already strained power sector.

President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has sought to obfuscate the issue of substandard coal imports by appointing a presidential commission of inquiry to probe all coal purchases since 2009. His modus operandi is like “using a loincloth to control dysentery”, as a popular local saying goes. There’ll be hell to pay when the JVP/NPP politicians responsible for the coal scam and other rackets lose power. It will then be their turn to be hauled up before courts and bussed to prison so that they will be in the exalted company of Aluthgamage, Fernado, Ranjith and others.

Wednesday 10th June, 2026

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) gave in to pressure from protesters and took former State Intelligence Service Chief Maj. Gen. (retd.) Suresh Sallay, in custody, to hospital and allowed his family members and lawyers to visit him. If it had done so previously and respected Sallay’s rights as a suspect, without leaving any room for allegations of physical and psychological abuse of him and other such police excesses, there would have been no protests.

Spokesman for the Archdiocese of Colombo Rev. Fr. Cyril Gamini Fernando has urged politicians and political parties to act with restraint and refrain from disrupting the ongoing investigations into the Easter Sunday terror attacks. The issue of Sallay allegedly undergoing ill-treatment at the hands of the CID is best left to the judiciary, he is reported to have said at a media briefing. His concerns should be heeded.

Protesters have categorically stated that they are not opposing the ongoing investigations in any manner and their intention is to ensure that the CID will stop violating the rights of Sallay held in custody under the PTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act), on a detention order issued by President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who is also the Minister of Defence.

In this country, governments tend to undermine all institutions including the judiciary. They are no respecters of the doctrine of the separation of powers. There have been political witch-hunts against even some Chief Justices. The J. R. Jayewardene government sought to remove Chief Justice Neville Samarakoon over a public speech made by him; the Mahinda Rajapaksa administration ousted Chief Justice Dr. Shirani Bandarnayake in 2013 in a highly questionable manner, and the Maithripala Sirisena government removed Chief Justice Mohan Peiris in breach of due process in 2015. Political parties, lawyers’ associations and the media have been compelled to defend judicial independence against a proposed government move to raise the retirement ages of the Superior Court judges arbitrarily to the detriment of the judges awaiting promotion. It was vehement protests by lawyers, the Opposition and the media that prevented the Rajapaksa-Wickremesinghe government from summoning some Supreme Court judges before the Parliamentary Privileges Committee over a ruling that went against the interests of that administration.

Thus, given the overbearing nature of governments intoxicated with power, the task of protecting human rights cannot be achieved through judicial interventions alone. The challenge becomes even more daunting when the Attorney General’s Department and the police act in concert to serve the political interests of the powers that be.

Those who unashamedly cheered as their political opponents were arrested and detained under the PTA during previous governments have taken up the cudgels for Sallay’s rights. Prominent among them are SLPP and UNP politicians. However, the fact that previous governments abused the PTA and suspects suffered at the hands of the CID cannot be cited in extenuation of the continuation of the abuse of the PTA and the ill-treatment of detainees, including Sallay. The JVP-NPP government came to power, promising to usher in a new political culture and restore the rule of law. That pledge must be fulfilled.

Partisan politics does not spare anything in this country. The JVP-NPP government stands accused of having politicised the Easter Sunday carnage probe by appointing two members of the NPP’s Retired Police Collective as the Public Security Secretary and the CID Director. Is the Police Department short of competent investigators to handle crucial probes?

It is hoped that justice will be served for the victims of the Easter Sunday tragedy without injustice being done to the suspects under investigation.

Tuesday 9th June, 2026

The UNP has taken exception to a comparison made by a website (Manthri.lk) between the initial stages of the UNP-led Yahapalana government under the presidency of Maithripala Sirisena (MS) and the incumbent JVP-NPP administration led by Anura Kumara Dissanayake (AKD) in terms of legislative activity. Both governments came to power by effectively harnessing anti-incumbency sentiments and promising good governance. At the six-month mark, the MS administration led in legislative activity, Manthri.lk has pointed out. It gazetted three times the number of bills, compared to the corresponding period during AKD presidency and had twice as many passed. However, at the nine-month mark the AKD presidency overtook in terms of bills that were passed. By the 18-month mark the score changed. The AKD government passed 12 more bills than the MS administration, according to Manthri.lk.

Arguing in an accusatory tone that the aforesaid comparison, which appears in a Manthri.lk article titled, “Run Rate of Passing Laws in Parliament”, is quantitative and not qualitative, the UNP has said that a number of progressive laws were passed during the Yahapalana government during the first 18 months of the MS government. It has said they include the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, the Right to Information Act, the National Medicines Regulatory Authority Act, and the National Minimum Wage of Workers Act, but the Dissanayake administration has not delivered reforms as such; it has only scrapped some entitlements of the ex-Presidents and former MPs. The UNP has apparently manufactured a grievance to lay out some progressive laws it was instrumental in passing during the Yahapalana. However, what the UNP has left unsaid is that AKD’s JVP was a Yahapalana partner in all but name and pressured that government to honour its promises. Curiously, after being ensconced in power, the JVP has not cared to fulfil its key election pledges.

An interesting picture emerges when the comparison between the initial stages of the two governments is extended beyond the new laws and legal amendments they introduced. What matters most is not the “run rate” or the score as such, but how the game was played, so to speak. These memorable lines from Henry Newbolt’s “Vitaï Lampada” come to mind: “And it’s not for the sake of a ribboned coat / Or the selfish hope of a season’s fame / But his Captain’s hand on his shoulder smote — ‘Play up! play up! and play the game!’” Unfortunately, the spirit of duty and self-sacrifice are not virtues cherished in Sri Lanka politics.

The Yahapalana government carried out a mega racket, the Treasury bond scam, shortly after its formation in 2015, severely denting its anti-corruption credentials. The JVP-NPP administration did likewise in January 2025, a few weeks after sweeping a general election and securing a two-thirds majority. A freight container scandal ruined its reputation; that was followed by a coal procurement scam. Driven by political expediency, both governments unashamedly embraced the very rotten political culture they had vowed to upend while out of power.

MS and AKD secured the executive presidency by pledging to abolish it. But they reneged on that promise after savouring power. MS embarked on his reelection campaign and sought to gain a boost for it from his war on drugs, but the Easter Sunday terror attacks ruined his chances of contesting another presidential election. AKD remains silent on his much-advertised pledge to do away with the executive presidency. His election manifesto, A Thriving Nation: A Beautiful Life, promises to introduce a new Constitution, abolish the executive presidency and ensure that a President without executive powers will be appointed by the parliament, but several government politicians have said AKD will seek a second term. The JVP/NPP has thus demonstrated that it also acts out of expediency and not principle. It is emulating its predecessors notorious for their Machiavellian approach to promises. A common denominator among all governments since 1994 has been the unfulfilled promise to abolish the executive presidency.

Most criticisms of the UNP-led Yahapalana government under MS presidency apply, mutatis mutandis, to the incumbent administration led by the JVP.