REFUGEE

A senior official from the Presidential Secretariat told that the President’s decision to give a tax concession to rice imports was prompted after hearing about Minister Bandula Gunawradena accepting massive commissions from rice imports to Sathosa.

The Presidential Secretariat has heard that Minister Gunawardena, who traveled to many countries to look into the possibility of importing rice to Sri Lanka, had requested for commissions from many foreign companies. The official further observed that the tax concession on rice imports would enable private traders to import rice preventing the Minister’s racketeers from earning undue profits.

The Presidential Secretariat has received several secret reports of Minister Bandula Gunawardena receiving large sums of money from racketeers for permitting the prices of essential items like rice, potatoes, sugar and even LP gas to increase in the market