A public interest activist has filed a motion in the Supreme Court seeking an order that former Treasury Secretary P.B. Jayasundera be disqualified from being re-appointed to the same position until investigations by the CID and the Bribery Commission are concluded.
P.B. Jayasundera |
The petition by Nihal Sri Ameresekere, former chairman of the Public Enterprises and Reforms Commission (PERC), was filed after a 7-judge SC bench, in a 6-1 majority verdict, on Thursday allowed a plea by Dr. Jayasundera to withdraw an undertaking -- given to the court earlier following the LMS privatization case -- that he would not hold public office in future.
Mr. Ameresekere was the 22nd respondent in the LMS case where a SC bench headed by former Chief Justice Sarath N Silva, reversed the privatization of Lanka Marine Services (owned by John Keells Holdings) and restored it to the state.
Dr. Jayasundera was fined in the case and subsequently court ordered the CID and the Bribery Commissioner to investigate 'unlawful actions' mentioned in the judgment.
Following that Dr. Jayasundera and John Keells Holdings Chairman Susantha Ratnayake were among others who made statements to the Bribery Commissioner.
The CID also held its own investigation in the case but the outcome of these investigations is yet to be disclosed.
In his petition, Mr Ameresekere said he had limited time to make oral submissions in court on Thursday in support of Statement of Objections (filed on July 27, 2009) where he had said that Dr. Jayasundera had not refuted nor denied the adverse findings against him as per the reports of the Auditor General, COPE, Public Accounts Committee and judgments of the Supreme Court, 'whereby they stood and stand admitted'. |
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