{"id":155891,"date":"2026-04-25T15:43:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-25T22:43:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=155891"},"modified":"2026-04-25T15:43:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T22:43:57","slug":"holes-in-the-treasury-coffers-and-tight-sealed-and-well-secured-banks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2026\/04\/25\/holes-in-the-treasury-coffers-and-tight-sealed-and-well-secured-banks\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018\u2019HOLES IN THE TREASURY COFFERS AND TIGHT -SEALED AND WELL SECURED BANKS\u2019\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sarath Wijesinghe President\u2019s Counsel Former Ambassador to UAE and Israel solicitor in England and Wales<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

Sri Lanka country with educated citizens and educated Law Makers<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri Lanka is considered to be a nation of educated intellectuals with a great history and exemplary banking system withstood the collapse of banks world over sometime back to the credit to the banking system in Sri Lanka. Today nation is being digitalized to be in per with the age of artificial intelligence with experts heading the ProJet. Sri Lanka is not a rich country and depending on loans granted by International Banks and friendly countries so that every Pounds or  Dollars matter to the citizen and to be treated fuds scared and used carefully with no chances to \u2018ROB\u2019 by insiders or outsiders. Country is fortunate to possess a government with a massive majority and professors, and lectures of universities and heads private tuition establishments, whose qualification and integrity has been questioned by some.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Banking System<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Central Bank has the supervisory power on private and public banks as a regulator with enormous powers, with unfortunate historical events of the Governor himself broke the bank and left Sri Lanka for a wedding in Singapore, and still continue to live as a citizen of the country, who is said to help his friend who people say helped him to escape. Laws delays applied and nobody is aware of when and where the stage of the litigation is \u2013 if there is. Banking system in very tight to the extent is  the hardest job for a citizen to obtain a loan as any bank is so strict asking for barrage of questions and sureties yet researchers say recovery process of colossal amount of robbery is \u2018look worm\u2019 slow with vague press conferences by politicians and not professionals as expected. Treasury is the institution that stored and protects our hard earned, and mostly borrowed money with all kinds of guards physical and technical.  NSB Bank is one of the top banks in Sri Lanka among top banks managed by top professionals, and it is to be noted any top appointment is to be approved and consented by \u2018invisible hands\u2019 at one of the richest institutions in Sri Lanka. Amount missing is callosal. Line minister who is the political head cannot run away from the responsibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Millions Syphoned<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Funds Syphoned from Treasury and NSB despite tight security, supervision and pass words, that worries the citizen armed with mobile phones with 110% penetration and internet freely used especially the young in Sri Lanka and abroad watching carefully monitoring the situations via social media and modern platforms Sri Lankans have full access to. Not necessary to repeat the amounts which has been repeatedly brought to notice well and good which is bad news to the citizen finding difficult to make ends meet with fast rise if cost of living.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hackers or Insiders? As historically it is a former CB Governor who broke the Bank and currently living in Singapore leading a luxurious life<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is such a colossal amount and full-scale inquiry is required against the read thief, and those who neglected the supervisory duty by willingly, negligently, or intentionally. Emergency is in power and under PTA one can be a \u2018\u2019Sallay\u2019\u2019 easily on suspicion of being straight in expressing views on public affairs which is a civic duty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rethinking on proposed Digitalization of the Nation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rethink on digitalization process of the economy, treasury and banks in the nation until and until we are fool proof not repeating the same mistake again and again. It is time for Dr Hans Wijesuriya to take more and more precautions before embarking on unknown areas and it is good to learn from Singapore, Hong Kong and Malasia on modern trends. Professionalism is lacking and the university lecture Sers are cot competent to run and administration and fiscal management executed by experienced professionals heading the technical ministries and departments, and English Education too matter lot. We wish and hope Dr Hans Wijesuriya will take care of the digitalization process well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Who are responsible and who has the supervisory power<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is the line minister, the Secretary and the Central Bank Governor who has the supervisory and administered power and we hope they will do the needful even though the horse has left the stable already.  Other worrying factor is the Secretary of the Treasury is a politician with many interests unlike previous precedents. Citizen hopes and believes corrective measures have already taken and funds lost will be recovered. Interdiction of an official may not be helpful as the funds may have gone overseas in seconds. It is a good idea to appoint an experienced honest professional and not a politician supervised by outside invisible forces to inquire into the episode  where country has lost billions. Citizen has a right to know the real story and whether precautionary measures have been taken or will be taken immediately and properly.  We wish and hope there will be no more robberies and Hakureis by hackers international or local. Sarath Wijesinghe PC<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sarath Wijesinghe President\u2019s Counsel Former Ambassador to UAE and Israel solicitor in England and Wales Sri Lanka country with educated citizens and educated Law Makers Sri Lanka is considered to be a nation of educated intellectuals with a great history and exemplary banking system withstood the collapse of banks world over sometime back to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-155891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sarath-wijesinghe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155891"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155891\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":155892,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155891\/revisions\/155892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}