Hon. Ananda Wijepala

¶ 01 I asked what the date was. Do not get excited. Please do not get excited. I asked the date. Do not get excited. If you do not have the date with you, say you do not have the date. It is fine; no issue.

¶ 02 Hon. Speaker, we have established Public Security Committees. You likely refer to the prior Community Police Committees. That is why I asked for the date. Because neither the Ministry of Public Security nor the Police Department has issued any circular requiring, when issuing character certificates via Public Security Committees, that such a certificate be obtained. Generally, obtaining a Grama Niladhari’s certificate relates to police reporting. After establishing Public Security Committees, there is no such requirement. What you presented relates to Community Police Committees. Those existed under previous governments. I do not know whether such certificates were taken then. That is why I asked you for the date—when this happened. However, if something like that has occurred at some police station, I will look into it. I will examine the police stations you mentioned. There is no requirement at all to have any certificate from a chairman or any member of the Public Security Committee. Based on the Grama Niladhari’s certificate, we have arranged for character certificates to be issued in the normal way. Neither the Ministry of Public Security nor the Inspector-General of Police has issued any circular on this. We emphasize this again to this House. After false news was spread yesterday that misled the country, you are now trying to reconfirm that the news is true.

¶ 03 Hon. Leader of the Opposition, you previously also said in this Parliament that the Public Security Committees have been politicized. Do you know that the Secretary of the Public Security Committee functions as the Grama Niladhari? The former Community Police Officer is the convener of the Public Security Committee. The chairman is appointed as follows: among those who applied to the Senior Superintendent of Police expressing willingness to work in this regard, a suitable person is elected by vote and appointed as chairman. There is no politicization in this. You said this previously as well. But again and again, we must emphasize that Public Security Committees are not politicized in any way.