Police Firm Despite Pressure From PM To Go Easy On UNP MPs Implicated In Bond Scam
The Police will not back down from investigating UNP Members of Parliament alleged to have received monies from Perpetual Treasuries Ltd (PTL) and its subsidiaries despite Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe taking issue with senior officers for naming certain parliamentarians in ‘B’ Reports submitted to court, according to Police sources.
Ranil
Sources close to the Prime Minister acknowledged to Colombo Telegraph that he had summoned Senior DIG (CID) Ravi Samaraweera and Director CID Shani Abeysekera prior to leaving for the UK and accused them of unfairly targetting UNP MPs by naming them in ‘B’ reports submitted to court with respect to the Central Bank bond scam.
The officers had assured the premier that they were not engaged in any such conspiracy and that they were merely following procedures as and when names come up, sources added.
Although Wickremesinghe’s castigation of the officers carried a subtle request to desist on this matter, the Police will not do so, Colombo Telegraph learns.
The issue was headlined when it was revealed that UNP minister Sujeewa Senasinghe had received money from PLT during the 2015 parliamentary election campaign and even afterwards.
Senasinghe denied that he had any knowledge of such donations and said that he would give the relevant amount to charities named either by the Speaker or the Chief Prelates.
However, Senasinghe earlier said that he would resign his parliamentary seat if it was found that he had received any money from PLT. He added at the time that he was from a wealthy family that rode horses and owned elephants and therefore did not need any financial help to run an election campaign.
Senasinghe was also named among many who had dozens of phone conversations with PLT head Arjun Aloysius, the man at the centre of the controversy on account of being the son-in-law of Arjuna Mahendran, the Governor of the Central Bank when the dubious transactions took place. At the time Senasinghe said he talked with Aloysius to obtain information for a book he was writing, but phone record show that many calls had been made long after the said book was published.
