Meanwhile, Attorney General’s Department sources informed Daily News that the Attorney General has taken a decision to, temporarily, not assign any official duty to Solicitor General Dilrukshi Dias Wickramasinghe PC. Senior Additional Solicitor Sanjay Rajaratnam has been temporally appointed to carry out the duties vested in the post of Solicitor General.
The probe request by the AG came after the voice recording of a telephone conversation, alleged to have taken place between the former Director General of the Bribery Commission and current Solicitor General Dilrukshi Dias Wickramasinghe and, Avant Garde Chairman Nissanka Senadhipathi had gone viral on social media.
Meanwhile, Dilrukshi Dias Wickramasinghe PC had released a facebook post claiming that her conversation with Nissanka Senadhipathi has been distorted and edited and then released to the social media. She had challenged Nissanka Senadhipathi, first accused in the ‘arms trafficking’ case, to release the unedited version of the telephone conversation.
When asked as to why Attorney General is not conducting an internal investigation against Solicitor General, Ms Jayaratne stated that the Solicitor General is the second most senior officer in the department so there is no other officer who could possibly be appointed to hold an inquiry against her as she is number two in the department.
‘The Attorney General is performing constitutional and statutory functions and called upon to advice government on legal matters and will be called upon to appear for and on behalf of the state in litigation and in the event that there is possible litigation in this matter if AG is called upon to be the inquirer in this matter. The Attorney General will be precluded from performing his statutory and constitutional functions in this case as there would be a conflict of interest.
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Thalatha seeks inquiry from AG
The Justice Ministry Secretary has requested the Attorney-General to conduct an investigation into the statement made by former Bribery Commission Director-General Dilrukshi Dias Wickremasinghe during an alleged telephone conversation with the Avant-Garde Chairman, Justice and Prison Reforms Minister Thalatha Atukorale said.
This was mentioned in a statement released by the Justice and Prisons Reforms Ministry.
“If a minister was involved in the action she had taken, she should divulge the name of that minister. Even if a minister was involved or not, Dilrukshi Wickremasinghe had no right to make such statements as a public officer,” Minister Atukorale said.
She added this while addressing the media after laying the foundation stone for the proposed court complex in Pugoda last Sunday.
