By: Staff Writer
February 12, Colombo (LNW): The Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) has filed legal action against seven persons, including five staff members of the Department of Motor Traffic (DMT) for the unlawful registration of hundreds of vehicles.
Accordingly, the CIABOC said it has filed said action against the seven persons over the registration of approximately 400 vehicles that had not been cleared by the Sri Lanka Customs, thereby incurring a significant loss of revenue to the state.
Issuing a statement in this regard, the CIABOC revealed that further information was gathered pertaining to 156 of the 400 vehicles, adding that several of them had been categorized as ‘luxury vehicles’.
According to a court order obtained by the CIABOC, seven of the 156 vehicles are to be handed over to the Sri Lanka Customs from their current owners. As such, five of the seven vehicles have already been handed over to Sri Lanka Customs.
State Finance Minister Ranjith Siyambalapitiya inspected illegally imported vehicles seized by the Customs, during a visit to the South Asia Logistics Terminal some times back
The Finance Ministry said that there were altogether 446 vehicles held since 2015. A statement issued by the Ministry quoted Siyambalapitiya as having said that action would be taken soon to sell these vehicles.
The Minister said that it would be a crime to allow the destruction of these vehicles at a time the country was in dire straits
Sri Lanka Customs, the Bribery Commission and the Department of Motor Traffic have uncovered a massive organized fraud that has incurred a loss of more than Rs. 5 billion in revenue to the government through illegal import of vehicles and their illegal registrations.
It has been revealed that this racket had been going on for a long time and more than 400 vehicles had been imported to Sri Lanka in this manner and have been registered illegally.
This was revealed following an investigation conducted into the “Mini Cooper” type vehicle, which was taken into custody by the Bribery Commission after being imported to Sri Lanka using forged documents.
The vehicle, bearing number KE-3845 was imported to Sri Lanka without the clearance of the Sri Lanka Customs and falsely entered into the computer system of the Motor Transport Department, causing a loss to the Government in excess of Rs.2.5 million.
When the facts were submitted to the Colombo Chief Magistrate, the Bribery Commission informed court that the said vehicle was brought to Sri Lanka using fake documents in 2007 and registered as a three-wheeler in 2015.
