GK depositors to get back their money from Friday
View(s):After six and half years of anxious wait and uncertainty, depositors of the defunct Golden Key Credit Card (GK) Company are to be provided with the relief they need with the commencement of the repayment process from Friday.This assurance was given by Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake twice to the public, first at the “Rathu Era” live programme of Swarnavahini two weeks back, and then at a media conference in Colombo this week.
Treasury funding of Rs. 8.5 billion will be used to settle the money of disgruntled GK depositors across the board under an action plan, a senior official of the Finance Ministry who wished to remain anonymous told the Business Times.
He said that the ministry has finalised all arrangements to begin the repayment process this week starting from depositors who have deposited less than Rs. 2 million.
Around 1,000 depositors are in the “upto Rs. 2 million” segment and a sum of around Rs. 400 million would be needed for their repayments, he pointed out. Depositors with amounts upto Rs.10 billion will be settled during the period August 24 to September 24 and those who have deposited over Rs.10 will be re-paid thereafter, he added.
Since the pledge given by Minister Karunanayake on May 4 to repay 41 per cent of the money of GK depositors, the Attorney General’s Department has not submitted the repayment plan before the Supreme Court on three days since then; on June 18, 25 and July 7 and the FR case was then postponed to August 4.
Legal experts said that there is no barrier for the government to make repayments from treasury funds because the FR case was against the former GK directors and the Monetary Board of the Central Bank. An activist of the GK pressure group, Malcolm De Silva told the Business Times that Minister Karunanayake has confirmed the date of commencement of the repayment as July 24 when he and another depositor, Anura Gunawardena, met him on July 9.
He said all depositors welcomed the prompt action taken by the Minister along with the Central Bank Governor who took measures to settle their grievances. Dushanthi Hapugoda, Director GK said that they were not informed about the repayment on July 24 by the Central Bank or the Finance Ministry adding that the board of directors of GK has not been disbanded.
She expressed the belief that the Minister will stick to his word despite pressure from influential parties.
She disclosed that they have repaid Rs. 700 million to 8,000 depositors during the past two and half years.