The move behind Investment Promotion Minister Dhammika Perera’s sudden outburst against Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was adduced to Prime Minister’s initiative to submit a Cabinet proposal to recover an outstanding amount of nearly Rupees 2600 million defaulted taxes from the Casino industry.
Dhammika Perera has pioneered the main Casino business in Sri Lanka, along with a few others.
At the last cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe, as the Finance Minister, presented two proposals to strengthen and regulate the collection of tax money amounting to rupees, 2600 million that the government stands to lose from the casino business. Insiders say that through the new proposals, the Prime Minister was targetting Dhammika Perrera, who was trying to fulfil his dream of becoming the Prime Minister.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who presented his proposals to the Cabinet of Ministers as the Minister of Finance, has sought the approval of the ministers to introduce new regulations to the Casino Business Regulation Act No. 16 of 2010 to regulate the business.
Also, the Prime Minister has submitted a proposal to the ministers to amend the Gaming and Betting Tax Act No. 40 of 1988 to apply for a license to engage in casino businesses.
Thus, under this Act, there is a requirement to obtain licenses for casino businesses. The Prime Minister has pointed out that these sectors are currently evading taxes due to the government in large sums. These amendments aim to add the defaulted taxes to the state coffers.
So far, casino businesses have evaded registration under the Gaming and Betting Tax Act.
The objective is to regulate this through the proposed amendments to collect more than 2600 million rupees. However, Dhammika Perera, who is currently preparing a strategic plan to take over the position of Prime Minister on the advice of Basil Rajapaksa, has called for the resignation of Ranil Wickremesinghe as the Finance Minister.]
Perera convened a press conference and announced that the Prime Minister should step down from the position of Finance Minister, citing many reasons.
