The subject of the Financial Crimes Investigation Division (FCID) summons issued to former First Lady Shiranthi Rajapaksa has been disclosed for the first time: Rs. 10 million obtained from a state-owned bank and deposited into a Siriliya Saviya Foundation account to buy a CT scanner for the Lady Ridgeway Hospital for Children.
Inquiries so far have not established that any CT scanner was bought with the money, NewsFirst reported. Investigators have also found that the equipment eventually presented to the hospital was a PET scanning machine donated by China — not a scanner purchased through the fundraising effort.
The FCID has already recorded a statement from Pradeep Kariyawasam, who chaired the state bank said to have provided the Rs. 10 million. Rajapaksa has been told to appear on 24 September.
Where she is
She left Colombo in the early hours of 16 September, shortly after being notified of the requirement to appear. Accounts of what has happened since do not agree.
The Daily Mirror, citing its own sources, reported that she is in Singapore undergoing a medical check-up at Mount Elizabeth Hospital. It said she had been admitted to a private hospital in Colombo last week and went to the airport directly after being discharged; that FCID officers went to the airport on learning she was leaving; and that the notice, initially sent to Carlton House in Tangalle, was served near the departure gate and accepted by a relative. An unnamed family member told the paper she is expected back on 19 September and will face the summons.
Manoj Gamage, spokesman for former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, told NewsFirst the family will not disclose her location, citing the political climate, and declined to give details of her condition, saying illness is a private matter. He said she had been treated at Nawaloka Hospital before travelling abroad for further care, that she would return as soon as possible to continue caring for her husband, and that the notice reached her only as she was leaving the country.
The two accounts are not reconcilable on the point that matters: the Daily Mirror names the hospital and the country, while the family says both are being withheld. Neither gives a return date the family itself will stand behind.
