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Bond scam: UNP MPs challenge COPE finding
View(s):The Parliamentary Oversight Committee on Public Enterprises (COPE) finding that former Central Bank Governor Arjuna Mahendran was directly responsible for a controversial Treasury bond scam in 2015 is being hotly challenged by the United National Party MPs on the committee.
It is learnt that the COPE report has also recommended that Mr. Mahendran and officials involved be investigated and the monies recovered from the former Governor.
A UNP COPE member who said he was not authorised to speak pointed out that the final draft report “has not yet been approved”.
COPE Chairman Sunil Handunnetti of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) confirmed that several UNP MPs on COPE refused to endorse the final report which was now being translated into Tamil and English. He hoped to present the report to Parliament next week, he said.
Several members of the Committee have, however, agreed to this final draft and have already signed their acceptance, he told the Sunday Times.
Mr. Handunnetti said UNP MPs were not in favour of the findings and wanting to submit dissenting reports. “Even if all the 26 MPs on the committee want to present individual reports, I will have to allow it,” he said.
The COPE draft also raises questions on how Perpetual Treasuries Ltd., benefitted by windfall profits after the bond issue and called for guidelines on how the Government should raise monies in emergencies.
The committee has also called for a review of transactions of Primary Dealers in secondary markets and how in this instance one party was favoured.
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) vote is not clear. Its leader Rajavarothayam Sampanthan was in Batticaloa and did not respond to telephone calls. The TNA vote will be crucial to decide on whether the COPE report will be passed with a majority.
The then Governor Arjuna Mahendran who was refused an extension of his term by President Maithripala Sirisena in June this year was at the centre of the COPE investigation fighting allegations that his immediate family profited financially by The Bank calling for Treasury bonds – a short term debt instrument guaranteed by the Government of Sri Lanka.
The COPE chairman said the bond issue was under investigation for the past several months and its members had looked in depth into the report of the Auditor General and a committee of the UNP that went into the matter. Central Bank officials including former Governor Mahendran were also interviewed.
Joint Opposition leader Dinesh Gunawardena told the Sunday Times, “I have been informed by our members about the findings in the 40-page draft final report which our members have accepted.”
However, the UNP MP said that their members had agreed when the draft report was presented to go through paragraph by paragraph and approve or reject them. “We were able to go through only 11 pages when we learnt the others had signed it. As far as we are concerned, there is still no COPE report. We have spent over seven hours on Friday going through the 11 pages by then, he said.
COPE has 26 MPs; UNP (10), SLFP (4), JVP (4), TNA (4), JO (3), SLMC (1).