{"id":55723,"date":"2016-06-18T14:40:11","date_gmt":"2016-06-18T21:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=55723"},"modified":"2016-06-18T14:40:11","modified_gmt":"2016-06-18T21:40:11","slug":"sirisenas-conundrum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2016\/06\/18\/sirisenas-conundrum\/","title":{"rendered":"Sirisena\u2019s conundrum"},"content":{"rendered":"

Island editorial\u00a0Courtesy The Island<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

June 18, 2016, 8:07 pm<\/span><\/p>\n

The possible reappointment of Mr. Arjuna Mahendran to a six-year term as Governor of the Central Bank has triggered more flak about a public appointment than any other in memory. Soon after the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime was dethroned in January last year, the then high profile Ajith Nivard Cabraal, who was perhaps the most politicized holder of that office ever, submitted his resignation. Mahendran was appointed to serve the balance of Cabraal\u2019s term which would have ended on June 30. The question now is whether he would be reappointed, ostensibly to serve a full term or to be eased out in the short term after a face saving maneuver where he would opt to resign and possibly become Sri Lanka\u2019s High Commissioner to the UK as is speculated. In the first instance, he was Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe\u2019s nominee for the job. It has been said that President Maithripala Sirisena wished to see Mahendran\u2019s back when the bond scandal, where a company belonging to his son-in-law made mega bucks, surfaced. But he survived thanks to the prime minister\u2019s backing.<\/p>\n

The president is now on the horns of a dilemma with several SLFP ministers of the government he heads demanding that Mahendran be not reappointed. Additionally, civil society activists who played a major role in electing Sirisena president, met the president and prime minister together on Friday to urge the governor was not reappointed. They won no promises. Deputy Minister of State Enterprise Development Eran Wickremaratne who enjoys an excellent reputation both for ability and probity, was intensively grilled by reporters at a Sirikotha press conference on Friday on whether Mahendran was being reappointed or not. Carefully walking a tightrope, he declined to offer his own thoughts on whether the incumbent should be granted further tenure. He merely said that he would share his views with the president who is the appointing authority and no other. In taking this decision, the president would have to take several considerations into account \u2013 first whether Mahendran wishes to serve six more years. Then Sirisena would have to measure the governor\u2019s success through the country\u2019s economic progress during his tenure as well as the bank\u2019s institutional performance.<\/p>\n

Wickremaratne was strongly critical of the SLFP going public on their desire to see Mahendran go. He saw this as a gross violation of collective responsibility. Theirs was a coalition government taking common decisions and cabinet ministers, particularly, as members of the executive branch of the government had a particular duty of collective responsibility. Decisions were not about getting political mileage for themselves. The issue was neither a UNP problem nor an SLFP problem “It is a question about the future of our country.” As to whether Mahendran would have a further stay at the crease, the former Royal College opening batsman virtually said that either Royal will win the match, or S. Thomas\u2019 will win or it will be a draw! No light whatever on what is going to happen was shed. So the question remains wide open as the drama builds up. Will Sirisena tell Wickremesinghe to nominate somebody else he likes and he would make the appointment? That, of course, would be an obvious compromise. Or will there be a face saving maneuver such as that stated at the beginning of this comment? Although a High Commissioner to the Court of St. James, a businesswoman who is a relative of the prime minister, was named many moons ago she has not assumed office for several months. We also don\u2019t know whether Mahendran will be a taker of that or any other appointment. Also, the question arises: “If not him, then who?” Will it be from within the bank or outside?<\/p>\n

Unfortunately the parliamentary Committee on Public Enterprise, then headed by Mr. Dew Gunasekera of the Communist Party, which was investigating the bond matter became functus when parliament was dissolved. Gunasekera put out a report in what looked too much like an effort by the side that lost the presidential election trying to score points over the winning side. It bore no signatures of none UPFA members of COPE. However, a new COPE from the incumbent parliament has resumed the investigation under the chairmanship of the JVP\u2019s Sunil Handunneti and will in due course reach a conclusion. Mahendran did himself no credit by his son-in-law resigning from the board of Perpetual Treasuries, the company involved in the alleged scam, after the smelly stuff hit the fan. This was a patently cosmetic gesture in the face of the fact that this company was a subsidiary of a holding company in which the son-in-law was half owner. His claim that the Supreme Court had cleared him of wrongdoing was also incorrect. Public interest activist Chandra Jayaratne had instituted a fundamental rights action in the Supreme Court praying that the court sets out processes to prevent controversial occurrences in the future. This action was not admitted and the courts made no finding whatever on the guilt or otherwise of any party.<\/p>\n

With President Sirisena under pressure both from the prime minister as well as the SLFP he leads, his first preference undoubtedly will be to find a via media out of the conundrum. He would obviously not want to offend his prime minister whose party played a major role in his election last year. He has also to be mindful of the opinion of the SLFP he leads. Perhaps he can take refuge in the first principle that there must be no conflict of interest between the functions of office holders and business interests of themselves and their close family members. For example a trawler owner should not be the minister of fisheries or somebody running a private hospital the minister of health.<\/p>\n

The outrage of the joint opposition over the so-called bond scam and conflict of interest issues was somewhat dented when it was revealed that the former governor\u2019s sister was also a director of Mahendran\u2019s son-in-law\u2019s Perpetual Treasuries when Cabraal was governor! She resigned after the controversy hit the public domain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Island editorial\u00a0Courtesy The Island June 18, 2016, 8:07 pm The possible reappointment of Mr. Arjuna Mahendran to a six-year term as Governor of the Central Bank has triggered more flak about a public appointment than any other in memory. Soon after the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime was dethroned in January last year, the then high profile […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55723","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=55723"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55723\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}