It is popularly said in this country that a politician out of power is like a ‘banana without skin’. These days, we see several such politicians being escorted in and out of various courts. They blatantly flouted the law with total impunity while in power, and roared like lions in Parliament and elsewhere. They may not have thought that they would have to face the consequences of their unlawful actions.
Deputy Solicitor General Lakmini Girihagama has made a shocking revelation before the Maligawatte Magistrate’s Court. Presenting to the court a report issued by a WHO-accredited laboratory in Germany, she said, on Thursday (19), it had been found that a stock of human immunoglobulin fraudulently procured under Keheliya Rambukwella’s watch as the Minister of Health, had no therapeutic efficacy and was contaminated with bacteria. Similarly, Rituximab, a cancer drug, procured in a similar manner, contained only sodium chloride, she said, informing the court that indictments would be filed before the Permanent High Court Trial-at-Bar shortly.
It is heartening that the law and karma have caught up with at least some politicians and their associates.
Former Ministers Mahindananda Aluthgamage and Nalin Fernando have already been jailed for causing losses to the state by procuring carrom boards and checkerboards through Sathosa for distribution among sports clubs, ahead of the 2015 presidential election. Former North-Central Province Chief Minister S. M. Ranjith, and his sister-in-law, who was his private secretary, were sentenced to prison for misusing state funds while in power. Cases have been filed against several other former ministers and their cronies as well for corrupt deals, etc.
Cases against the aforementioned politicians were filed before last year’s regime change. The incumbent government has vowed legal action against three former Presidents over what has come to be dubbed a dairy cow scandal, which caused a loss of over one billion rupees to the state coffers, according to NPP politicians. One can only hope that the government will carry out its pledge to bring those politicians to justice, without making another about-turn, after gaining some political mileage. One of the NPP’s main election promises was to evict the former Presidents from the state-owned houses currently occupied by them and do away with their perks. It is now humming a different tune.
The present-day government politicians would do well to learn from the predicament of their political rivals languishing behind bars or facing legal action for corrupt deals and other such transgressions. When they lose power, they, too, will be like the proverbial ‘bananas without skin’; they will be left with no one to turn to. It may be recalled that during the previous government, the then President Ranil Wickremesinghe defended Rambukwella to the hilt, and even had a motion of no confidence against the latter defeated in Parliament. Legal action was instituted against Rambukwella because he became too embarrassing for the government to defend. Wickremesinghe has reportedly told the CID that Rambukwella misled the Cabinet and is therefore solely responsible for the procurement irregularities in question. His former Cabinet colleagues and political masters who threw their weight behind him while in power cannot absolve themselves of the blame for the procurement of fake drugs.
A committee, appointed to study the green-channellng of 323 red-flagged cargo containers in January 2025, under suspicious circumstances, has submitted its report. The reported findings of the committee confirm suspicions about the release of the containers without Customs inspection. The committee has recommended a further audit. This recommendation runs counter to the government’s claim that there was no wrongdoing. A future government is bound to reopen the probe into the questionable release of containers, and if any official tries to cover it up, he or she will be held answerable; such state employees will be without anyone to protect them. They will be compelled to reveal the truth under interrogation, the way some junior police personnel are doing at present before a committee probing their former boss, interdicted IGP Deshabandu Tennakoon. The predicament of some former Health Ministry panjandrums allegedly involved in the procurement scandal while in service will deter the state officials responsible for the controversial clearance of cargo containers from defending politicians.
It is hoped that the NPP government will go all out to have all the crooks who committed serious transgressions during the previous administrations brought to justice, and the politicians and officials accused of malpractices under the current dispensation will be dealt with similarly under a future government.
