COPE Chairman has evidence Southern Expressway Stinks of Bribery

By Niranjala Ariyawansha-2017-08-31


The Government has lost a massive Rs 36 billion due to the Cabinet Committee on Economic Management (CCEM) granting approval to increase the length of flyovers on the Matara-Hambantota Southern Expressway Project, COPE Chairman Sunil Handunetti alleged yesterday.

The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) Member of Parliament said, the move had been taken without the consent of the Cabinet of Ministers.

Handunnetti said at a media briefing yesterday that, in November last year, the Secretary to the Prime Minister, Saman Ekanayake, sent a letter to the Secretary to the Ministry of Highways informing him that the CCEM had made a decision to increase......the aggregate length of the planned flyovers by 2.78 kilometres.

Handunnetti questioned the technical expertise that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and other members of the CCEM, Charitha Ratwatte, R. Paskaralingam and Minister Malik Samerawickrema had to carry out this task. He also asked whether this extension was given the go-ahead by a technical evaluation committee.

He also queried as to how the CCEM can act beyond the authority of the Cabinet and Parliament when a decision involving such a large sum of public money is made.

They also revealed that a sum of US Dollars 11.9 billion which should have been brought to this country through the Chinese Exim Bank by the China Railway Fast Survey And Design Institution, has not yet been received by Sri Lanka. The China Railway Fast Survey And Design Institution is providing consultation services for this project.

He also alleged that the engineers who have been flown down to Sri Lanka on visitor visas to provide advice on the Matara-Hambantota Expressway are being paid huge salaries by the Road Development Authority (RDA), violating rules and regulations regarding tourists and finances of the country.

He said that it is the Prime Minister's Senior Economic Advisor Paskaralingam who had authorized the issue of visas to enable payment of salaries to the engineers of the Chinese consultancy firm. "The estimated sum to be spent on the Matara-Hambantota section of the Southern Expressway is Rs 243 bn. Loans for the project are being obtained from China. The Construction Contractor is Chinese.

 Advice on construction is being obtained from China Railway Fast Survey and Design Institution Company. They can include delay charges as well and present us with bills in the future on behalf of the services they provided. Then Sri Lanka has to pay them. Then if the company has not brought in money to this country, how can we pay? Then the danger is that if we are unable to pay back the debt, we will have to sell off this Southern Expressway to compensate for the loans," Handunnetti emphasized.

Handunnetti also asked the Government to reveal to the country who is using the Mercedes Benz vehicle imported to this country, duty-free, by the contractor on 21.11.2016, alleged to have been provided as a bribe for increasing the length of these flyovers.

Handunnetti added that "The Finance Ministry has issued a circular to exempt from duty the vehicles that are imported to the country for use in the project.


"It is learnt that if these are passenger transport vehicles, duty has to be paid on them. Concrete or metal fabrications for the project are not transported in a Mercedes Benz. However, the Chinese Project Director has requested in a letter that the Mercedes Benz vehicle imported be exempted from duty. This vehicle is not mentioned in the project. We know where the vehicle is and who is using it. This is clearly a bribe that was given as a reward for increasing the estimated cost of the project."