Gotabaya rejects Ravi’s accusation on BoC account

Gotabaya rejects Ravi’s accusation on BoC account
January 19, 2015 12:57 pm
Ada Derana

Former Secretary of the Ministry of Defence and Urban Development, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, today rejected allegations leveled against him, regarding an account in the Thaprobane Branch of the Bank of Ceylon containing nearly Rs 8 billion under his name.

In a press conference yesterday (18), newly appointed Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake claimed that a sum of Rs. 7,500 million was found in the bank account under the name of the former Defence Secretary and that the money has now been transferred to the Treasury.

“This is grossly misleading and appears to discredit my reputation with ulterior motive,” Rajapaksa said, in a statement released to media.

He stated that there is an Operational Account held with the Bank of Ceylon Thapprobane Branch dedicated for the use of financing the construction of Army Headquarters building at Pelawatta.

He alleged that the account was created with the approval of the Cabinet from the revenue from the sale of land at Galle Face, Colombo where the Army Headquarters was previously located.

“After the relocation and construction work was started, withdrawals were to be made from it based on the progress of the construction work undertaken by various contractors and suppliers,” he said.

Rajapaksa says the account is operated by the Chief Accountant and other authorized officials of the Ministry of Defence under the overall supervision of the Secretary of Defence.

“All cheques are issued with two signatures upon the receipts of certified payment vouchers. As I recall, the Account was open with the total receipts of about Rs. 20 billion in 2011 and withdrawals have been made each year thereafter for the payment of certified claims from contractors,” he said.

He added that the names and signatures of authorized persons are available with the Bank and Chief Accountant of the ministry and that the balance as at the last day of his holding office was “certainly over Rs. 8 billion.”

“The figures can be verified from the Treasury as annual deposit balance is reported to the Government balance Sheet,” Gotabaya Rajapaksa said.

“As I have ceased to be the Secretary to the Ministry of Defence, my successor is the automatic custodian of that Account and he can verify all these. My name appears in the signature card in my capacity as Secretary Defence along with other authorized officials and hence it has nothing to do with my personal account.”

“Therefore, there is no truth whatsoever that I have a personal account in the Bank of Ceylon with Rs. 8 billion. I deny this completely and request the Secretary to verify this with the bank and the Treasury and disclose the correct situation on this account,” he said.

Depositing money of a Govt., land sale in a separate account is irregular & against financial rules. The proceeds of the land sale should go to the Treasury Consolidated Fund and when they need money back they should draw it from the treasury using budgetary allocations. Having separate funds out side budgetary allocations distort the national budget.

This had been the practice of the past looters.
Soon we will see more.
When such things are unearth, they vehemently deny innocence and their girl-fanning foolish followers claiming "slinging mud".

Ethical Trader wrote:Depositing money of a Govt., land sale in a separate account is irregular & against financial rules. The proceeds of the land sale should go to the Treasury Consolidated Fund and when they need money back they should draw it from the treasury using budgetary allocations. Having separate funds out side budgetary allocations distort the national budget.

Ethical Trader wrote:Depositing money of a Govt., land sale in a separate account is irregular & against financial rules. The proceeds of the land sale should go to the Treasury Consolidated Fund and when they need money back they should draw it from the treasury using budgetary allocations. Having separate funds out side budgetary allocations distort the national budget.

You are talking about the normal circumstances. Can't you see they have obtained cabinet approval ?

Every penny sent to the consolidated fund is a stone aged rule. In many places it has delayed the Govt. work and services provided to others due to delay in cash flow. I have seen many such places . Due to this problem some Departments have totally given up money making activities and people have to go to private sector for the services paying very high charges.

Army has sold their Galleface land and use that money to build a modern HQ.
Connecting corruption and looting to this shows the level of knowledge about these activities.
Funds from any account are spent same way, following same rules. You can't spent public money differently based on the account you draw them.

yes , we know how  lethargic these government institution when to come to work. gota is a special man who cannot wait for implementation of work/task. this arrangement is a practical way. he had the power to approach cabinet get necessary approval. whats the wrong. an energetic man like Gota cannot depend on these rigid procedures of the government for his speedy work. if he worked like an any other ordinary govt servant we cannot see many good things he had done to the country today. Country need people like GOTA.

instead of making senseless allegations  government should look in to  find out this money has been spent illegally or not. otherwise no use of all these allegation. if these money is illegally spent, then ravis allegation has some credibility. Spreading falls allegation is very much damaging to the society and to the country.

The newly appointed Secretary of Defence, B.M.U.D. Basnayake, today confirmed that the account held with the Bank of Ceylon’s Thapprobane Branch, containing nearly Rs 8 billion, is not under the name of his predecessor and that it belongs to the Ministry of Defence.

In a press conference yesterday (18), Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake had claimed that a sum of Rs. 7,500 million was found in a bank account under the name of the former Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa and that the money has been transferred to the Treasury.

However, Rajapaksa has rejected the allegations leveled against him as “grossly misleading” and an attempt to discredit his reputation with “ulterior motive.”
In a statement released to media earlier today, he stated that it is an Operational Account dedicated for the use of financing the construction of Army Headquarters building at Pelawatta.

Rajapaksa also said that the account was created with the approval of the Cabinet from the revenue from the sale of land at Galle Face, Colombo where the Army Headquarters was previously located.

New Defence Secretary Basnayake confirmed these claims while also refuting Karunanayake’s allegation that it was used by the former Defence Secretary as a personal account.
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It's rare to see a clear denial of an allegation, at least to me

Anyway Ravi should correct his misinformed statement regarding this.

hon RAVI KARUNAYAKE , oya den loku lamayake.
you cant talk like before. finance minister is one of the top most position of the country. alimankada pamankada like talk not suitable for the post. this post was previously held by people like NM whose words were believed like words written on stone by people of the country. that is due to credibility ,integrity of that kind of people .always you should think twice before you talk. last time, chandrika kicked out unp government mainly because of your irresponsible behaviour, bullying president in the cabinet meeting etc. learn a lesson from the past.

Chinvi, its true that this deviation has got cabinet approval but it sets a very bad precedence and the Parliament will not be able to controle the public finances in the future if this is allowed to continue.

I have no grudge against this individual who completed many projects expediciously but am worried about this bad precedence of deviation from time tested procedures.

If you guys prefer fast implementation of projects more than the financial discipline, then, every Dick & Tom will try to follow this precedence of spending government funds like in a kopi kade.

Systems are there to safe-gard the public funds and inbuilt delays are inevitable, because these are not your own money but public funds. This bad precedence leaves many loop-holes to swindle public funds as they are spent out side national budget which eventually distort national accounts.

When the Govt., is borrowing money from banks for day-to-day expenses paying high interest rates one individual is allowed to keep billions of rupees idelling in his ministry account to implement his pet projects.

If this money was sent to the Treasury they could have reduced their borrowings. The rationale behind central controle of Govet money is efficient usage of cashflows reducing un-necessary expenses. Ultimately all of us have to pay for this inefficient management of public finances.

@ Ethical Trader,


I am not talking about the funds. Funds are always controlled by the Government.
With the new order, they have sent back cash to the consolidated account from MOD account and again they have to transfer cash back to MOD account to pay the contractors.

Whether the cash is in main acct or Ministries account paying procedures are same. I think MOD did this to keep their cashflow. Treasury has other priorities and normally fund transferring get delayed by months.

Your other point, interest income : I have no idea but I think they got some interest because some other projects they invested remaining cash to get some short term income.

Is this what is going to happen in the future? Hama ekatama "yes" kiyana aya pathkaranna vage yeanne. Rajya niladarinta madyata kelinma adhas prakasha kerimatath thahanam nioyogath deelai thiyenne.

pushpakumara wrote:Is this what is going to happen in the future? Hama ekatama "yes" kiyana aya pathkaranna vage yeanne. Rajya niladarinta madyata kelinma adhas prakasha kerimatath thahanam nioyogath deelai thiyenne.

No brother. The frirst statement of the new Secretary to the Defense Ministry is wrong. He acted like a man on the street not as a public officer well-warsed with financial discipline in the public sector. After-all he is the Chief Accounting officer in the ministry. The statement of the Army spoksperson too is wrong. These guys were working for the previous Govt., too long and have fogotten the vital financial rules & just talk rubish. He was trying to white-wash his predecessor. Poor fellow, he might have to face the music now. Better keep his mouth shut if he does not know rules.

Ethical Trader wrote:

pushpakumara wrote:Is this what is going to happen in the future? Hama ekatama "yes" kiyana aya pathkaranna vage yeanne. Rajya niladarinta madyata kelinma adhas prakasha kerimatath thahanam nioyogath deelai thiyenne.

No brother. The frirst statement of the new Secretary to the Defense Ministry is wrong. He acted like a man on the street not as a public officer well-warsed with financial discipline in the public sector. After-all he is the Chief Accounting officer in the ministry. The statement of the Army spoksperson too is wrong. These guys were working for the previous Govt., too long and have fogotten the vital financial rules & just talk rubish.  He was trying to white-wash his predecessor. Poor fellow, he might have to face the music now. Better keep his mouth shut if he does not know rules.

If that is the case it has to be proved beyond doubt the funds have been misused. It can not be a
big task in auditing the fund and find how money has been utilised after creating this particular account.(opening such account is right or wrong is beyond my knowledge on this area). The question is all have taken decisions/raised doubts /say this and that before finding the truth. For me as a layman it is no more than mud slinging. Why the government is in such a hurry in finding fault with previous regime?. Is it because they have only 100 days? Hope this trend of finding mis management of public funds will continue beyond 100 days and after elections (if elected)

Main question is this fund is misused or not. they have to find out that .
Procedures used for money handling  is a secondary  thing .
if the purpose is good, and the money is used for that particular purpose then  there is no fraud.

Like it was told in the Satan program, all the vehicles misused by the Rajapakse looters should be paraded in the Galle Face.
And today there is a statement by Mr.Kotalawala (Ceylinco) as to how the Rajapaksa brothers looted his Ceylinco group under the cover of Golden Key.
More things will come to the surface in future.
I can see so many BMWs rottening in the yards.