COPE raps FFSL for doling out Rs 2 mn to EC
View(s):The members of the parliament watchdog, the Committee on Public Enterprise (COPE) this week severely criticised a decision by the Football Federation of Sri Lanka (FFSL) to dole out nearly Rs 2 mn as allowances for the three member-election committee. The election of office bearers will be held on May 30, 2021.
Responding to questions from COPE Chairman Prof. Charitha Herath, Jaswar Umar, the General Secretary of the FFSL said that it had decided to pay Rs 750,000 allowance to the Chairman of the election committee while Rs 600,000 each to remaining two members.
The payments are huge compared to what they have paid previously. The federation has paid an allowance of Rs 25,000 to the previous election committee.
At the meeting it was revealed that the proposal to pay such a hefty sum was put forward by the current President of the FFSL Anura de Silva who was not present at the meeting due to an urgent personal matter and had the support of the majority of the Council.
“Personally I opposed this and there were others who shared the same view that public money should not be paid like that. But the President had the support of the majority and our voices weren’t heard,” responded Umar.
He said according to the FFSL constitution, the President has the power to appoint 18 members to the Council in addition to 10 elected at the Annual General Meeting.
“This the problem. We can only raise our concerns as the President usually has the majority support with those appointed members,” he explained.
COPE Chairman instructed the Secretary to the Minister of Sports Anuradha Wijekoon to look into the matter and enforce constitutional changes to make the body more democratic.
Wijekoon said that an order would be issued soon to prevent the appointment of 18 members by the President.
The Committee also drew the attention to irregularities that has taken place during the regime of Manilal Fernando who is serving a life ban.
The chairman said a sum of Euro 40,400 (nearly Rs 6 million) which had been donated by the Italian Football Players Association to construct a football playground in Kalutara, a sum of $60,000 (nearly Rs 6 million) which had been given by the Asian Football Federation for competitions, a sum of Rs 10 million which had been given by a private company to construct 20 houses for tsunami victims and a sum of $200,000 which had been donated by the Asian Football Federation were reported to have been deposited in Mr Fernando’s personal account.
It was also revealed that the current President of the federation had submitted an affidavit to the court stating that no such financial irregularities had taken place.
“This is a serious issue and I don’t think we should discuss this without the presence of the current President and the person who is responsible for the financial misappropriation.”
Accordingly the meeting was adjourned for another date where summons will be issued to both Manilal Fernando and Anura de Silva to come before the COPE committee to investigate the matter.