Monday 27th May, 2024

An attempt by the Committee on Public Finance (COPF) to convene a meeting as part of its ongoing inquiry into the on-arrival visa scandal has come a cropper once again owing to the unavailability of relevant state officials, according to media reports quoting an ‘X’ message posted by COPF Chairman Dr. Harsha de Silva. The COPF has been compelled to reschedule the meeting for 04 June, as a result. This is a very sad state of affairs that Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardene should take serious note of. The possibility of government politicians and some public officials having resorted to dilatory tactics to cover their tracks cannot be ruled out. Hence the need for the COPF investigation into the visa scam to be conducted to a conclusion expeditiously.

Dr. de Silva is reported to have previously stated that the officials from the Ministry of Public Security and the Department of Immigration and Emigration had avoided the COPF inquiry scheduled for 14 May. Such noncompliance amounts to a breach of parliamentary privileges.

The government MPs have sought to have even the respected judges of the apex court summoned before the parliamentary Privileges Committee over some landmark judicial decisions that made them squirm and gladdened the hearts of all right-thinking citizens. They as well as their Opposition counterparts frequently demand that the Central Bank officials be summoned before Parliament over some petty issues such as semantics pertaining to official documents. Given the manner in which the MPs safeguard their privileges, the aforesaid public officials would not have avoided the COPF meeting without an assurance from the government that they would not have to face the consequences of their action. If they are allowed to act in this manner, that will create an extremely bad precedent.

Dr. de Silva has reportedly said in his ‘X’ post that the COPF has uncovered some vital information about the visa controversy and will release everything after its final meeting on the issue; the COPF is committed to exposing the truth behind the controversial GBS/IVS tender, he has added. Let him be thanked for his bold stand, but in making such a statement, he has thrown caution to the wind. He will be a marked target hereafter and the government will do everything in its power to delay the COPF process lest the truth should come out much to the detriment of its interests in this election year.

There is nothing the beleaguered SLPP-UNP regime, which is in fact a dead man walking, will baulk at doing to retain its hold on power and avoid a crushing electoral defeat. It will go to any extent to prevent the truth about the visa scam being revealed ahead of the upcoming presidential contest. One need not be surprised even if the government has one of its stooges appointed as the COPF head in a bid to derail the ongoing probe. It has already made the COPE (Committee on Public Enterprises) putty in its hand and ruined the integrity of the Constitutional Council by manipulating it to have Deshabandu Tennakoon appointed the IGP. It is said popularly in this country that for someone who has swallowed a vehera or dagoba, bolting down an aggala (a kind of sweetmeat) is only child’s play.

The manner in which the government is trying to scuttle the parliamentary probe into the visa scam reminds us of how the Yahapalana government prevented the submission of the first COPE report on the Treasury bond scam to Parliament ahead of the 2015 general election. The then President Maithripala Sirisena dissolved Parliament before the presentation of the report, and a UNP MP obtained a court order preventing the release of the vital document to the public. He has joined the SJB and is heard promising to eliminate corruption under an SJB government!

What one gathers from the COPF Chairman’s ‘X’ post is that the bureaucratic lackeys who have facilitated the visa scam at the behest of their political masters think they are above the law. Unless immediate action is taken to humble these panjandrums and help expose the mastermind/s behind the visa scam, anti-politics will gain a turbo boost and the ranks of those who made an abortive effort to march on Parliament in 2022 will swell.