The Presidential Secretariat is set to acquire 16 vehicles on lease, MP Chamara Sampath Dassanayake told Parliament on Wednesday, saying a gazette notification covering the leasing has already been issued.
“Please look into this matter if you are not already aware of it,” the MP told members of the government benches, the Daily Mirror reported.
The remark was framed as a disclosure to the government side rather than a question put to a minister, and the Daily Mirror’s filing carries no response from the government benches, from the Presidential Secretariat, or from any minister.
What the filing does not establish
The report does not give the gazette number or date, the lease value or term, the type of vehicles, or the supplier. Nor does it say when the vehicles are to be delivered, which budget line the leasing falls under, or what the Secretariat says the vehicles are for.
It also does not say how the figure relates to the Secretariat’s existing fleet, or whether the leasing is additional to it.
This desk could not find the item reported by any other verified newsroom at the time of writing. The Daily Mirror filed it at 7.23 p.m. Colombo time, and it may yet be picked up; the account above rests on that single filing.
Government vehicle use is a subject Dassanayake has raised in the House before, and earlier rounds of the argument have turned on figures for the Secretariat’s total fleet rather than on individual leases. Those exchanges are from previous years and are not cited here.
Not reported
No outlet reports whether the gazette has been tabled, whether the Committee on Public Finance has reviewed the leasing, or whether any member of the government responded to the claim.
Source: Daily Mirror.
