… five senior officials suspended

President’s Counsel Maithri Gunaratne has urged the Parliament to intervene in an ongoing investigation conducted by the Treasury into the wrongful payment of USD 2.5 mn loan instalment to a third party instead of the country that gave the loan to the Government of Sri Lanka.

Gunaratne, in a letter addressed to Speaker Dr. Jagath Wickremaratne copied to leaders of all political parties represented in Parliament, General Secretaries of those political parties, Committee on Public Finance, Auditor General and National Audit Office, has stated the payments were made between December 2025 and January 31, 2026.

Lawyer Gunaratne took up the issue on behalf of civil society grouping ‘Free Lawyers’ after gathering information related to the alleged payments. Spokesman for ‘Free Lawyers’ Keerthi Tennakoon told The Island that they expected the Parliament to act swiftly and decisively. Pointing out that the ‘disappearance’ of USD 2.5 mn took place amidst the massive National Development Bank (NDB) fraud, amounting to Rs. 13.2 bn, Tennakoon emphasised the responsibility of the Parliament to take charge of the investigation.

According to Gunaratne’s letter, seen by The Island, following an international investigation carried out by a technical committee, two Treasury Directors, two Deputy Treasury Directors and a senior official responsible for IT had been interdicted.

As the relevant payments amounted to USD 2.5 mn, the process couldn’t have been completed without the involvement of the Deputy Secretary, Treasury and Treasury Secretary, Gunaratne stated.

According to him, the Central Bank had been responsible for loan payments until recently but the alleged irregularities happened after that task was brought under the Department of External Resources and Public Debt Management Office.

The Free Lawyers said that as the Secretary to the Treasury, Harshana Suriyapperuma, was also the Secretary to the Finance Ministry, the Parliament should intervene to establish a suitable mechanism to investigate this.

Former NPP National List lawmaker Harshana Suriyapperuma succeeded Mahinda Siriwardena in late June 2025.

Tennakoon said that they felt the need to bring the shocking development to the public domain as those who knew of the incident remained silent.

By Shamindra Ferdinando