Indian foreign policy fiasco in Sri Lanka

April 9, 2016, 8:46 pm 

The controversy that took centre stage in the run up to the New Year holidays was the leaking of a list of Sri Lankans who had allegedly maintained secret bank accounts in Panama. This was part of a global expose which has already caused the Prime Minister of Iceland to resign with pressure mounting on British PM David Cameron to follow suit. Though people connected to the yahapalana campaign like Dr Wickremabahu Karunaratne said that he expected the Rajapaksas to be on that list, it so turned out that there were no Rajapaksas on it but one of Minister Champika Ranawaka’s closest allies, Vidya Dilruk Amarapala. In putting out the list of Sri Lankans named in the Panama Papers, Colombo Telegraph said cautiously that there are legitimate uses for offshore companies and trusts and that they do not intend to suggest that any persons or companies named had broken the law or acted improperly.

However the very phrase ‘undisclosed bank account’ leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Even David Cameron is being asked to resign not because he had millions stashed away in Panama accounts but because he had shares amounting to 30,000 pounds in a company started by his father in the 1980s. In a knee jerk reaction to the news of Sri Lankans being among those holding offshore accounts in Panama, the Anti-Corruption Front run by CAFFE and headed by Ranjith Tennakoon went to town saying that the Indian government had formally informed Panama that the money in the accounts held by Indian nationals belonged to India and he lamented the fact that the Sri Lankan government had not yet done anything of the sort.

Vidya Amarapala is well known in political circles as a close confidante of Champika Ranawaka and was at one time the Chairman of the CEB. Journalist Faraz Shauketaly refers to Amarapala as a ‘fund raiser’ for Champika Ranawaka. However this is not the first time that Amarapala has been in the news over offshore accounts. The same matter came up back in 2013 and at that time Amarapala said that prior to his appointment as the Chairman of the Ceylon Electricity Board, he served as an Executive Director at IWS Holdings Group of Companies. Sovereign Capital Corporation had a joint venture with IWS Holdings Group Company and Amarapala had been appointed as a Director of Sovereign Capital Corporation by IWS Holdings as its representative back in 2003. Amarapala claimed that his appointment was only to represent IWS interests in the Joint Venture and had no involvement with any financial matters in the Sovereign Capital Corporation.

However Dr Harsha de Silva then a UNP parliamentarian was not satisfied with Amarapala’s answer and he said that no one is interested as to who appointed him to the board of the company that held the secret account or his job description in that company. The only question is as the Chairman of a public corporation, did Amarapala disclose this information in his annual filings as required by law? Dr Harsha also said that the CEB Engineers’ Union had made various allegations regarding highly irregular deals during his tenure particularly the Aggreko contract which according to de Silva, violated government tender guidelines. It is unlikely that de Silva will take this matter up in the same way since he and Amarapala are now on the same side.

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