A political commentary circulating through the site’s editorial desk makes a series of serious allegations about a 2016 plan to replace Ranil Wickremesinghe as Prime Minister with Sajith Premadasa. The claims are those of the writer, Keerthi Ratnayake, and have not been independently verified.
According to the commentary, Sirasa chairman Killi Maharaja was once a close backer of Premadasa. It says the relationship cooled over a dispute from the 2010 parliamentary election, when Maharaja allegedly asked for six National List seats and Wickremesinghe was unwilling to grant them.
The writer alleges that from then on Maharaja plotted to remove Wickremesinghe and make Premadasa party leader, and that in 2016 he launched a plan to install Premadasa as Prime Minister. Maithripala Sirisena, Harsha de Silva and Justice Prasanna Jayawardena are named as the alleged participants.
The commentary points to business and family links. It says de Silva’s son and Justice Jayawardena’s son both worked at Capital Alliance, a firm it describes as a business associate of Maharaja. Capital Alliance, it says, was among the companies that bid in the bond auction, but the bond contract went to Perpetual Treasuries, which the writer describes as a company close to Wickremesinghe.
The writer further claims that de Silva passed data on the bond transaction to Maharaja, who publicised it through his media network. Sirisena then appointed a presidential commission to examine the bond deal, with Justice Jayawardena put in charge of it, the commentary says.
It lists three alleged aims of the plan: removing Wickremesinghe and making Premadasa Prime Minister, making de Silva Finance Minister, and making Justice Jayawardena Chief Justice.
The writer goes on to say that by 2022 the political mood had shifted and Premadasa had become a rejected figure. It then claims that Maharaja’s son was a prominent supporter of the Galle Face protest movement and later a main contributor to Anura Kumara Dissanayake.
Background
The Treasury bond auctions held at the Central Bank have been the subject of long-running political and legal controversy in Sri Lanka, and inquiries into them have been linked to wider political rivalries.
What it means
These are untested claims by one commentator, not findings by any court or commission. Readers should treat them as opinion until the individuals and companies named respond or the allegations are examined by an authority. The Colombo Tribune has not independently verified any of them.
