Sri Lanka’s proposed amendments to its Anti-Corruption Act are raising concerns that measures introduced in the name of protecting privacy could significantly weaken public scrutiny of the wealth of public officials.
The Anti-Corruption (Amendment) Bill, gazetted on July 24, 2026, proposes several changes to the principal legislation. Three provisions, in particular, have drawn criticism from Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) and legal experts, who warn that they could undermine transparency reforms introduced through the 2023 Anti-Corruption Act.
At the centre of the concern is Clause 11, which introduces subsection 88(1A). The provision would restrict the use of a redacted asset declaration obtained by a member of the public. Such information could be used only for submission to an officer or institution specified under section 86.
Any other use would become a criminal offence, carrying a fine of up to Rs. 100,000, imprisonment of up to one year, or both.
The proposed restriction could have consequences far beyond ordinary misuse of personal information. Journalists, researchers and civil society organisations routinely rely on publicly available declarations to identify unexplained wealth, conflicts of interest and discrepancies between declared assets and other information.
TISL argues that criminalising such public-interest use would effectively penalise people for scrutinising information that the state has itself made publicly accessible.
Another concern lies within Clause 11, specifically section 88(1)(f). While the Bill identifies categories of information that may be redacted including addresses, dates of birth, identification numbers, bank details and deposit information it would also permit the Commission to redact “any other information” it considers a privacy violation.
Critics say the phrase gives the Commission Investigating Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) overly broad discretion without clearly defined legal criteria.
That discretion could allow declarations to be stripped of information that is not inherently private but is essential for detecting corruption, they argue. Without narrowly defined standards, the extent of disclosure could potentially depend on how individual officials interpret privacy.
A third contentious change appears in Clause 7. It would repeal section 81(e), removing the requirement for a declarant to disclose the assets and liabilities of a cohabitant who has shared the household for at least six months.
The provision is significant because wealth can potentially be held in another household member’s name while remaining under the effective control or benefit of a public official. Removing the disclosure requirement could therefore make beneficial ownership and unexplained wealth more difficult to trace.
TISL has urged the government to retain cohabitant disclosure safeguards, narrowly define information eligible for redaction and remove the proposed criminal penalties for legitimate public-interest use.
The organisation also maintains that existing laws covering defamation and harassment already provide remedies against genuine abuse. In its view, creating new criminal restrictions risks turning transparency itself into a liability.
The central question, therefore, is whether the amendments strike a genuine balance between privacy and accountability or whether they could make the wealth of those entrusted with public power harder to scrutinise.