26 February 2017 09:04 pm
The largest financial fraud that believed to have taken place in the Sri Lanka’s history so far. JO parliamentarian Bandula Gunawardene said the Presidential Committee of Inquiry (PCoI) is attempting to prove that the Bonds were issued following a gazette notification released by ex-President Rajapaksa.
Addressing a press briefing, he said that the fundamental process of issuing the Treasury Bonds was started on February 20, following a letter sent by the operations department attached to Treasuries to the Central Bank’s (CB) Public Debt Department requesting the money to cover the cash flow for the month of March 2015.
“Treasuries has analysed that 13.55 billion was needed, as per the cash flow they prepared. On February 23, CB’s Monetary Board decided to issue a 30-year-bond to fulfil the forthcoming month’s financial requirement,” he said
MP Gunawardena said that according the calculation, the Bonds issued in 2015 are maturing on 2045, and the authorization was given by the Finance Ministry to sell the Bond for a period of 30 years.
“On 25, the Central Bank announced that they only needed 1billion for the Government financial requirement and they were issuing a 30-year-Treasury Bond to lend money and published the auction date as 27,” he said.
He said on February 26, 2015 Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake and Cabinet Minister Kabir Hashim, Secretary of the Finance Ministry Prof. Samaratunga and the Secretary of the Higher Education and Highways Ministry have visited the CB Governor and told him that there was a liability of 44 billion to the contractors of highways and 15 billion needed as an immediate requirement.
He further said that not the former president who requests to sell these Bonds or authorised to lend money through these Bonds. He said that the scam came to light following the CB’s internal data breach where the CB governor was responsible as he told Perpetual Treasuries about the sudden increase in the Bonds' value.
Former Minister Gunawardena stressed that this scam was a result of the confidential internal data breach and was not the then President Rajapaksa’s fault. He said that the PCoI currently interrogating on some edited part of the history of this Bond issue.
“Finance Ministry cannot lend money in accordance with old gazettes. The government was conspiring to place the blame on Former President by saying he has signed the gazette whereas only a letter was sent to CB requesting the funds, and the gazettes were not even involved,” he said. (Thilanka Kanakarathna)