A retired deputy commissioner of the Excise Department and a serving excise corporal have been remanded until 17 November over an allegation that they accepted cheques as bribes from a licensed company.
Colombo Chief Magistrate Asanga S. Bodaragama ordered both men remanded after submissions by the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC), Hiru News reported.
The suspects were named as Channa Jayanath Alwis Weerakkody, a retired Deputy Excise Commissioner, and Polgampalage Sampath Ranasinghe, an excise officer attached to the Matara Excise Station. CIABOC arrested them on Thursday at about 9.05 a.m. and 9.15 a.m. respectively, the Daily Mirror reported.
The allegation
Weerakkody is accused of accepting cheques drawn on the accounts of a legally licensed company that fell under his supervision, while he was serving as Excise Superintendent of Kalutara and as Acting Excise Superintendent (Distilleries) in Aluthgama.
Ranasinghe is accused of accepting the same cheques as bribes, despite having no official authority to receive them in his capacity as an excise officer attached to the company’s distillery. That shared instrument is what connects two officers separated by several grades.
The arresting agency is identified in Hiru News’s own photograph of the Commission’s trilingual nameboard, which reads “Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption”.
Still unstated
The reports do not give the value of the cheques, name the licensed company, or say over what period the alleged conduct took place. They do not say whether Weerakkody’s retirement preceded or followed the conduct alleged against him.
One point of wording is worth recording. The headline on the first Hiru News filing placed the arrest “at the Matara Excise Station”, while both that report and the Daily Mirror describe Matara as Ranasinghe’s posting rather than the location of the arrest. The Daily Mirror separately describes him as attached to the company’s distillery.
Neither suspect has been convicted, and an arrest and remand are not findings of guilt.