Financial Times

Supreme Court refuses appeal plea from Okanda
The Supreme Court recently refused a plea from Okanda Investment (Pvt) Ltd. and Okanda Finance (Pvt.) Ltd to appeal against a judgment of the Court of Appeal in relation to Central Bank clarification whether Okanda was involved in collecting deposits from the public.

The two companies had filed action in the Court of Appeal objecting on several grounds to the Central Bank Director requiring information and documents from them for the purpose of determining whether the companies are engaged in the finance business as defined in the Finance Companies Act.

In the judgment, the Court of Appeal said the Director is entitled to call for information and documents in order to determine whether the companies are in fact engaged in deposit taking disguised in the name of "credit investments".

The court rejected the argument that the information requested was confidential and also that the respondents i.e. the Director and the Monetary Board acted in bad faith.

The two companies then petitioned the Supreme Court in an appeal from the decision of the Court of Appeal. The respondents in the Supreme Court case were the Director, Department of Supervision of Non-Bank Financial Institutions, Central Bank (Director) and the Monetary Board. The Supreme Court bench comprised Justices Shiranee Bandaranayake, T B Weerasuriya and N G Amaratunga. Nihal Jayamanne, PC with Ms.Nuranie Amarasinghe and Anandalal Nanayakkara appeared for the petitioners while. P.A.Ratnayake, PC, Additional Solicitor General with M.R.Ameen, State Counsel appeared for the Monetary Board and the Director.

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