By Harischandra Gunaratna

The Joint Opposition yesterday urged the government to hold an impartial inquiry into the story that appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age of Wednesday (24) that President Maithripala Sirisena had solicited a bribe of 27,000 Australian dollars from the Australian company Snowy Mountain Engineering company. when he was Agricultural Development and Agrarian Services Development Minister in 2009.

Addressing journalists at the Dr N. M. Perera Centre at Borella, Ampara District UPFA parliamentarian Wimalasairi Dissanayake said the alleged bribe had been sought to award a contract to build a dam here and added that the Austrlian media had gone viral on the issue.

It was a World Bank funded project he said.

Kegalle District MP Taraka Balassuriya said “This is a serious matter and we cannot jump into conclusions as the allegation could sometimes be false, hence we need to conduct an impartial investigation.”

The young parliamentarian said that the adverse publicity triggered by the Australian media had stamped a black mark on Sri Lanka and “we have act fast to clear our name if the reports are not true”.

The Sydney Morning Herald said that the Australian Federal Police had already launched an investigation into the matter and alleged that there had been e-mail correspondence between the company’s Sri Lanka manager and its top management in Australia that Sirisena and his adviser had asked for a ‘political donation’.

However Sirisena had denied of any such deal.

Courtesy:The Island