Early this month Sri Lanka made a formal request seeking extradition of ‘big fry’ the ex-central bank chief a Singapore national from Singapore in connection with an insider trading investigation; after he failed to appear before a Sri Lankan court despite being summoned over allegations of malpractice during a 30-year-bond sale in 2015 when he led the central bank. The government had been somewhat slow to respond to the public outrage on issue of these government bonds; involving questions as to the competence of the Government and the Central Bank with the allegations of insider dealing. The matter is long from resolved as all actors involved in this massive crime are yet to be identified and the sad part about this is that the loss is estimated to be around SLR 19 billion, was well executed with one motive and that is to rob the country. If this robbery did not take place, the issues of the people fighting to have at least one meal a day, heart and kidney patients, children with no schools, workers, teachers and suicidal farmers and many more issues could have been resolved.
On the other hand ‘a small fry’ the principal of a boys’ school in Jaffna arrested by the Bribery Commission yesterday after receiving a bribe SLR 50,000. The principal had demanded a bribe of SLR 100,000 to admit a student to Grade 7 and had earlier obtained SLR 50,000 and the police had arrested him while accepting the remaining sum of cash from the party involved in the corruption, for it needs a giver and a taker to complete the crime.
Corruption has raged for too long in the country in fact for many decades, it had an exponential growth after the introduction of executive presidential system in the 1970’s. Now the people of Sri Lanka is compelled to put right what went so wrong, for corruption everywhere and has become part of live. Any responsible government should tolerate nothing, big or small with one huge combined effort should wage the battle against corrupt actors of all forms and watch them fall! Must rid of them all the one who is responsible for the corrupt act and those help in the act or encouraged it for together they have made the country poorer and these wrong doers must be made to pay for their crimes.
Northern Breeze 