Indictments against Johnston, two others in bribery case

The Colombo High Court yesterday served indictments to former MP Johnston Fernando and two others over the bribery case filed against them for relieving Sathosa employees from their duties to engage in political activities.

The case was taken up before Colombo High Court Judge Navaratne Marasinghe.

Indictments were served on the accused and they were released on cash bails of Rs.50,000 and two sureties of Rs.1 million for each accused by the Colombo High Court.

The Colombo High Court imposed a travel ban against the accused until the final conclusion of the trial. Accordingly, the accused were ordered to handover their passport to the court and were directed to report to the Bribery Commission’s investigation unit on the last Sunday of every month.

The case was fixed for pre-trial-conference on September 30 by the Colombo High Court.

Previously, the Bribery Commission filed fresh indictment against three accused including former Minister Johnston Fernando in connection with the alleged dismissal of 153 Sathosa employees from their legal duties and use of them in political activities.

On January 28, the Colombo Chief Magistrate ordered that the suspects be released from the case subject to re-file case, due to the Bribery Commission informed the court that the case had been filed without the written consent of the three Commissioners of the Bribery Commission and that it was not possible to proceed with the case. Accordingly, the Bribery Commission re-filed a case with a fresh indictment against former minister Johnston Fernando and two others.

The case was filed against former Minister Johnston Fernando when he was acting as the Trade Minister,former CWE (Lak Sathosa) Chairman Eraj Fernando and former Minister’s Private Secretary Raj Mohideen Mohammad Zakeer for allegedly causing an Rs.11,093,615.73(around 11 million) unlawful loss to the government by employing the employees of the Cooperative Wholesale Establishment (CWE) for election work during the period 2012.

The Director General of the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption filed these corruption cases against three accused under Section 70 of the Bribery Act on four charges.