‘System-Wide Failures’ at the Finance Ministry
By Sanja de Silva Jayatilleka The recent parliamentary debate and the Report of the Committee on Public Finance (COPF) on a cybercrime at the Finance Ministry offered a glimpse into the depths of financial and procedural confusion at the apex of the country’s institutions managing its economy, including foreign debt. The can of worms they […]
The recent parliamentary debate and Committee on Public Finance's (COPF) report shed light on financial and procedural chaos within the Finance Ministry, which is under the presidency's control. A fraud linked to cybercrime resulted in the theft of USD 2.5m of public funds. The COPF report, signed by all committee members, represents a unanimous consensus.
The transition of relevant functions from the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) to the Ministry of Finance (MoF) in late 2025 sparked the incident. Despite CBSL's previous alert systems preventing two sovereign debt payments from reaching a cybercriminal, the Australian debt payment went through to a criminal's account. The report holds the External Resource Department (ERD) and Public Debt Management Office (PDMO) responsible for their lack of duty.
The government failed to notice significant risks in their processes, resulting in a financial loss to the state. The lack of coordination between the CBSL and MoF was also an issue, as highlighted by a letter from COPF to CBSL in March 2025. The opposition leader emphasized that the report clearly mentioned the USD 2.5m of public funds were stolen, with senior officials including the Secretary to the Treasury and Governor of the Central Bank bearing responsibility for several lapses.
Written by urgent.news from The Island Sri Lanka's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
