Former Director General (Community Affairs) in the Presidential Secretariat Rajith Keerthi Tennakoon yesterday alleged that interested parties, including a section of the media, had sought to discredit some of those who served the previous administration.
The ongoing coverage of the vehicles, alleged to have been abandoned by those who used them at the time of the Sept. 21 Presidential Election, was nothing but a despicable bid to direct public anger towards them, one-time Governor of the Southern, Uva and Central Provinces and ex-NGO activist Tennakoon said.
Tennakoon added that on the day after the presidential election, the person who served as his driver had handed over the vehicle to an official of the Presidential Secretariat, outside the transport department, located on the opposite side of the Janadhipathi Mandiraya. According to Tennakoon, subsequently the Presidential Secretariat had sent that vehicle to the vehicle park.
“But, a section of the media, including social media, named me as a person who had abandoned the official vehicle at Galle Face,” Tennakoon said. The former civil society activist received the appointment on Aug. 22, 2022, a month after the SLPP parliamentarians elected
Wickremesinghe as the new President to complete the remainder of Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s term.
Tennakoon alleged that a section of the media had falsely accused some people of using vehicles released by the Presidential Secretariat. Alleging that some of those who had been vilified over abusing public property never obtained vehicles from the Presidential Secretariat, Tennakoon said that he would complain to the Press Complaints Commission unless the relevant media corrected the false news item literally accusing him of abandoning his vehicle at Galle Face.
The former official said that some of those still working at the Presidential Secretariat had also been falsely accused of abandoning their vehicles at Galle Face (SF)
