The people’s United Opposition yesterday appealed to the IMF to take tangible action to rein in the Lankan government. Following a meeting with IMF Mission in Colombo yesterday, the group issued the following statement:

“As leaders or representatives of several groups in the Opposition, we are seeking an urgent appointment to meet with you on any date between 16 and 18 June to focus on some critical issues.

“Our purpose is to bring to your immediate attention a severe and rapidly growing concern among the general public of Sri Lanka. As the citizens who ultimately bear the sole legal and financial obligation to service and repay international lenders, the public is growing increasingly alarmed by the state’s failure to safeguard national revenue and borrowed funds.

“While we acknowledge the IMF’s contribution and assistance in stabilizing Sri Lanka’s macroeconomic framework, we refuse to accept a reality where these gruelling stabilization efforts, along with the heavy taxes extracted from the public, are exploited, mismanaged, or outright wasted by a corrupt or incompetent state administration.

“While ordinary citizens continue to absorb the heavy personal impact of elevated direct taxes, expanded indirect levies, and high utility tariffs, a series of highly publicized, colossal public finance leakages, operational failures, and procurement anomalies have emerged within the state apparatus. These incidents point to a catastrophic collapse of internal controls and governance safeguards across multiple state organs:

 “Procurement and Tender Violations in Energy: The recent Special Audit Report on the 2025/2026 coal procurement exposed direct violations of mandatory bidding registrations and quality controls, costing the state billions of rupees in avoidable overconsumption losses.

“High-Premium Petroleum Procurement: Serious transparency concerns have emerged regarding the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation’s (CPC) procurement structures, highlighted by the highly publicized disclosure regarding “door-to-door” refined petroleum deliveries to Sri Lanka reaching as high as USD 286 per barrel due to combined spot pricing, inflated premiums, and logistical overrides. This massive premium structure represents a severe fiscal drain on state-owned utilities and directly contradicts the cost-recovery and efficiency mandates agreed upon under the IMF framework.

 “Irregularities in International Tech Procurement (The Biometric E-Passport Dispute): Of grave concern to international trade credibility are the systemic irregularities surrounding the 5-million e-passport procurement system. This process triggered severe diplomatic and commercial friction after formal complaints were lodged by international stakeholders, including Poland, regarding a lack of competitive transparency, irregular extensions, and altered tender parameters. The resulting procedural deadlock and subsequent legal disputes have severely disrupted essential state document issuance, revealing a failure to manage high-value international digital infrastructure contracts objectively.

“Asymmetric Information Leakage in Vehicle Import Duties: Of critical concern to revenue integrity is the recent public scandal involving the premature leakage of upcoming tax and tariff increases on vehicle imports. Evidence strongly suggests that details of the impending fiscal adjustments were leaked to select large, well-connected automotive importers prior to the official gazette. This insider access triggered a massive, last-minute surge in the opening of Letters of Credit (LCs) by these specific entities, allowing them to legally lock in shipments under older, lower tariff rates, actively suppressing billions of rupees in anticipated state customs revenue.

“Bypassing of Customs Safeguards (The “Red Channel” Releases): Parallel to this is the irregular clearance of 323 high-risk containers from the Colombo Harbour without undergoing mandatory physical inspections. Despite being explicitly flagged by the Risk Management System (RMS) under the “Red Channel,” these shipments were cleared via an extraordinary internal committee override. The Sri Lanka Customs Officers’ Union has publicly stated they cannot verify the contents, creating immense exposure to customs revenue evasion, while the Parliamentary Select Committee inquiry remains completely inconclusive.

“State Treasury and Postal Department Cyber Breaches: The diversion of USD 2.5 million from the Treasury’s External Resources Department (ERD)—initially intended for bilateral debt repayment to the Government of Australia—alongside the unchecked loss of USD 625,000 via email spoofing within the Department of Posts across consecutive fiscal years, highlights an intensely compromised internal transaction environment lacking elementary verification protocols.

“Flawed Automated Banking and Welfare Systems: The execution of duplicate internal payment files through the state banking system led to an erroneous remittance of over Rs. 263 million to Road Development Authority (RDA) contractors. This operational vulnerability was further mirrored by the duplicate manual batch disbursement of Rs. 248 million to Aswasuma welfare recipients, illustrating how political deadlines continue to bypass automated institutional risk controls.

“Whether these incidents are framed by state authorities as genuine operational “mistakes” or serve as a convenient pretext for internal corruption, the fundamental takeaway remains identical: the state currently lacks the internal financial controls and enforcement willpower necessary to safeguard public funds and state revenues.

“When the IMF prioritizes aggressive revenue-extraction targets without demanding equal accountability on how those funds are protected and spent, it inadvertently creates a moral hazard. Allowing the state to hide behind the excuse of “system glitches,” “port congestion,” or “insider leakages” dilutes the core objectives of the IMF’s own Governance Diagnostic assessment for Sri Lanka.

“Fund cannot maintain a passive stance while public revenue leaks through systemic vulnerabilities. We request that the IMF actively intervene by applying direct structural pressure on the government, ensuring that adherence to strict expenditure safeguards, policy confidentiality, procurement transparency, and anti-corruption measures are treated as rigid prerequisites for ongoing disbursements.

“The citizens of Sri Lanka cannot be expected to fund a leaking bucket. True economic recovery requires that structural discipline applies to government spending just as stringently as it applies to public taxation.

“Thank you for your unstinted support, objective analysis, and continued attention to the governance framework of Sri Lanka.”