Employees of the Geological Mines Bureau are perturbed over the inability of three Cabinet Ministers under whose purview the Geological Mines Bureau operated to remove the errant Director General, Dr Sajjana De Silva.
The errant Director General of the Geological and Mines Bureau is currently on compulsory leave.
Repeated requests by a former chairman of the institution in this connection have also failed to bear any fruit.
Sajjana De Silva is on mandatory leave because of several charges levelled against him, including illegal sand smuggling in the Eastern Province and committing environmental damage on an unprecedented scale.
It is revealed that all three ministers have not been able to remove him due to the pressure emanating from a powerful political family.
The director general has been accused of obtaining a duty-free vehicle license illegally, in addition to acting outside the scope of his duties.
Owing to these accusations, the former chairman of the Geological and Mines Bureau, Dr. O K Dissanayake, and former ministers in charge, Mahinda Amaraweera, SM Chandrasena, and the current Minister Nasir Ahmed, have asked the authorities to remove him.
However, it did not take place because this director general received the blessing of a powerful political family in the south, more powerful than these ministers.
The Daily Mirror newspaper, which has published an investigative piece on corruption and malpractices taking place in this institution, mentions that a powerful member of a family with political connections to Kurunegala and Hambantota has exerted pressure to restrain the authorities from removing the questionable director general.
The employees of that office have also confirmed to the Daily Mirror that the majority of mining license holders for sand mining in the Eastern Province are from Kurunegala and Hambantota districts.
It has been reported that frauds committed in the eastern province, including the Safinagar sand scam, have prompted the authorities to remove the former chairman of the Geology and Mines Bureau, S.P. Manjula.
Director General Dr. Sajjana de Silva has also been sent on mandatory leave in connection with the same issue.
The employees point out there are several other high-ranking officials in the office who supported these scams, and the employees have demanded the Secretary of Environment, Anil Jasinghe, send them too on compulsory leave.
