Special Report
The champion of accountability has gone quiet. Sri Lanka deserves to know why.
Dr. Harsha De Silva has built his entire political identity on one proposition. That someone, finally, must be held accountable.
He has said it from opposition benches. He has said it in television studios. He has said it in Parliament with the kind of controlled fury that makes people believe he means it. When corruption was abstract, Harsha made it concrete. When institutions looked away, Harsha pointed.
Sri Lanka trusted that voice.
Which is why his silence on Sarath Ganegoda is so loud.
Ganegoda sits as Chairman of SriLankan Airlines, the national carrier drowning in debt, haemorrhaging routes, and staring down an additional fuel bill of multi million dollars from April. He simultaneously maintains active commercial ties to a powerful conglomerate whose aviation arm represents airlines competing directly with SriLankan on its most critical routes.
There is no disclosed recusal mechanism. There is no Chinese Wall. There is no public record of Ganegoda ever leaving the room when SriLankan’s pricing strategy, route expansion, or procurement decisions were discussed.
Management sources within SriLankan Airlines allege that boardroom pressure suppressed India route expansion while a competing airline, represented commercially by Ganegoda’s associated conglomerate, grew its Sri Lanka services and captured the market SriLankan abandoned.
Between 2019 and today, SriLankan lost over 50 weekly flights to India. It once made history operating 100 weekly flights there. That market is now owned by others.
Allegations circulating in government and industry circles go further. That sensitive commercial information left the boardroom. That it travelled in directions it should never have reached.
COPF exists precisely for moments like this.
Dr. Harsha De Silva chairs COPF.
So. Five questions.
Question One.You have summoned officials to testify over far lesser matters. You have demanded answers on procurement irregularities involving far smaller sums than what SriLankan Airlines carries in debt. Why has Sarath Ganegoda not been summoned to appear before your committee and answer, under oath, how he manages his dual commercial loyalties while chairing a public institution?
Is the threshold for your scrutiny determined by the severity of the allegation, or by who is sitting in the chair?
Question Two.You championed the Anti-Corruption Act as a generational reform. You argued, correctly, that conflict of interest provisions for public officials needed teeth. The Act has those teeth.
Ganegoda’s situation is a textbook application of those provisions.
Why have you not called on CIABOC to open a formal inquiry? A single letter from the Chairman of COPE would carry institutional weight. You have written letters for less. What is stopping you from writing this one?
Question Three.SriLankan Airlines is a public institution sustained by public debt. Its losses are borne by Sri Lankan taxpayers. When a national carrier retreats from its most important market and a competing airline fills that space, commercially represented by entities linked to the sitting Chairman, the public interest is directly engaged.
You have never needed permission to speak on matters of public interest before.
Why does this one feel different?
Question Four.Your political brand was built in opposition, holding governments accountable regardless of party. You were not selective. You named names. You showed documents. You asked the questions nobody else would ask.
Sarath Ganegoda was appointed by this government. The government you now work and flirt with.
Is that the variable that has changed? Because if it is, Sri Lanka needs to know that the Harsha De Silva who sits in COPF today operates differently from the one who stood against corruption.
Question Five.CIABOC is waiting for political cover to move. The Auditor General responds to formal requests. Parliamentary committees derive their power from members willing to use it. You are the Chairman of COPF. You have the platform, the mandate, the legal authority, and fifteen years of credibility built on the singular promise that accountability applies to everyone.
SriLankan Airlines is on the verge of collapse. Its staff are afraid. Its routes are gone. Its debt is the public’s burden.
And its Chairman has questions he has never been made to answer.
You built your name asking the questions that needed asking.
This is one of them.Sri Lanka is watching to see if you still will.