A story doing the rounds in political circles is that a Chairman of a State Bank ( Peoples Bank or Bank of Ceylon) took a bribe of LKR 150 Million for approving a loan of over 2 billion to a hotel group ( Pearl Grand Hotel Group? ) .
The loan must now be non performing or in a moratorium giving no income to the state bank. We have several times highlighted the Rs 40 Billion of Bad loans in peoples bank given to political cronies. The officers concern have not been reprimanded by Central Bank to date. One such officer was approved by the Central Bank to become a Chairman of a private bank. That is the level of mismanagement that is happening with in the Central Bank. Why waste tax payers money to have a Central Bank if they can’t protect public money ?
We are investigating who the Chairman who collected the Rs 150 million and whether he is still the Chairman or being given a new assignment in another big state enterprise where he can continue his corrupt activities? The country will never come out of the morass if we don’t surgically remove corruption from the public sector.
It was last week we highlighted how a top public official bought a Benz from ill gotten commission allegedly earned from a gas or petroleum deal. We are exposing these allegations in the public interest despite the limited information we have. Corruption must stop at the top levels for the poor man to make a living and come out of poverty.
Adolf.
