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CB Governor, senior officials in verbal spat over transfers
View(s):Dissatisfaction over a series of controversial transfers of senior officials at the Central Bank (CB) last week led to a verbal spat between Governor Arjuna Mahendran and top officials including Assistant Governors.
As about 30 officers of Grade 4 and above including Assistant Governors were having a noon meeting on Tuesday at a 14th floor committee room to discuss concerns about new transfers and plans to hire retired bank staff as consultants, the Governor unexpectedly walked into the room and confronted the officers, bank sources who didn’t want to be identified, told the Sunday Times. Assistant Governors are the highest ranked officers at the CB after the (Senior) Deputy Governor and Deputy Governors.
“There was an argument that ensued with the Governor taking the position that discussions like this are not the right (procedure) while participants defended their right saying they have had meetings like this in the past too to discuss their grievances,” one source said. A photographer was seen taking pictures of those present.
Immediately the next day, reacting to the ‘defiance’ from a section of the staff, the authority to book committee rooms including the one where the ‘crisis’ meeting was held was transferred to the Governor’s Secretariat from another department.
“This is to inform you that in addition to reservation of CI, C2 and C4 (which) is presently carried out by the Protocol Division of the Secretariat Department, reservation of meeting rooms, i.e. C3 and C5 and committee rooms of the John Exter International Conference Hall (JEICH 1-4) which was under the purview of the Facilities Management Department have been transferred to the Governor’s Secretariat Division (GSD) of the Secretariat Department, with effect from 25th September, 2015,” a circular issued by the Director, CB Facilities Management, said.
There was no comment from the Governor or his office. A set of questions was emailed by the Sunday Times to the CB’s Information Department seeking clarification from the Governor on these issues. However until yesterday there was no response.The September 18th transfer of 15 senior officers caused uncertainty amongst many officers while there were unconfirmed reports of more transfers in the coming days, the sources said.
The transfers, the list of which is given below, included officials who had given evidence before the Parliamentary Committee that probed the disputed bond issue in which the Governor’s role was questioned. None of the officers moved to other positions had advance notice of the transfers. The transfer list issued on Friday by A.M.N. Gunawardana, Director/Human Resources, is as follows:
1) E.A. Hettiarachchi – Director/ITD as Director/Facilities Management Department;
2) M.I. Sufiyan – Secretary as Director/Northern and Eastern Provinces;
3) K.M.A.N. Daulagala – Director/SNBFI as Director/North Central and North Western Provinces;
4) U.P. Alawattage – Director as Director/Supervision of Non-Bank Financial Institutions Department;
5) D.M. Rupasinghe – Controller of Exchange as Director/Upcountry;
6) M.J.S. Abeysinghe – Director/CBS as Director/Southern Province;
7) U.H.E. Silva – Director/FMD as Director/Centre for Banking Studies;
Yvette Fernando -Director/BSD as Controller/Exchange Control Department;
9) C.M.D.N.K. Seneviratne – Superintendent/PDD as Director/Information Technology Department;
10) T.H.B. Sarathchandra – Additional Director/IOD as acting Superintendent/Public Debt Department;
11) S.H. Gunawardena – Additional Superintendent/CRD as acting Director/Bank Supervision Department;
12) K.H.A.S. Ariyaratna – acting Additional Director/STD as Secretary/Secretariat Department
13) T.D.H. Karunarathne – Additional Superintendent/EPF as Additional Superintendent/Currency Department
14) M.S.K. Dharmawardena – Additional Superintendent/EPF as Additional Director/Regional Development Department; and
15) M.Z.M. Aazim – Acting Additional Superintendent as Acting Additional Director/Statistics Department.