Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB) MP Dayasiri Jayasekara taking part in parliament sessions on Tuesday (7) charged that the National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka (NOCSL) had failed to hold its annual general meeting for 2025, while failing to pass its budget for this year.
He alleged that under such suspicious circumstances the NOCSL was planning to press ahead with its election of office bearers for the four-year term 2025-29 on 25 April.
“The NOCSL has also failed to submit the completed audit report for 2024, whereby all sports associations are duty bound to handover their audit reports before 28 February each year,” the MP said.
“But, the real travesty of it is that the National Olympic Committee (NOC) which is the parent body of all Olympic sports of this country, have been guilty of dereliction of their duty. And who is responsible for this pathetic state of affairs,” the former Sports Minister questioned.
Jayasekara stated that the NOCSL has surreptitiously put forward a budget for 2026 which its Executive Board had failed to ratify through an AGM during the past year.
“Now these officials are attempting to ratify that budget for this year. I would therefore like to ask from the subject Minister, as to what action the Ministry intends to take on this,” the lawmaker asked.
“I ask this because if this action had been resorted to by any other sports association, they would have been suspended by now. But, this Government is mollycoddling the NOCSL. And that is the wider perception among the public.”
Jayasekara added that a letter has also been submitted to Sports Minister Sunil Kumara Gamage dated 23 April 2025 citing grave concerns over the conduct of the current head of the Olympic House.
However, the MP charged that to date the Minister concerned had allegedly failed to act on the contents of the letter submitted to him and challenged the latter if possible to probe the charges directed at the incumbent president of the NOCSL even after one year had lapsed.
The Opposition MP further revealed that money related to a personal gift given to current Director General (DG) of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) captain Husain Al-Musallam who was in the country from Noritake, had been allegedly retaken by the NOCSL.
“I have the necessary audio tape to substantiate my allegation against the NOCSL top brass, and I will also be tabling it,” the ex-Minister emphasised.
He also disclosed that the current Executive Board of the NOCSL had formed an Ethics Committee to suit its own vested interests while putting forth regulations barring other sports administrators with proven track records from contesting its looming election.
“This particular Ethics Committee consists of close henchmen of the NOCSL head. The Energy Minister of this Government despite being indicted by the High Court continues to warm his chair. But, certain sports people with unblemished track records are allegedly prevented from contesting the NOCSL election later this month, citing spurious charges against them. Isn’t this similar to pot calling the kettle black.”
He said that the Olympic House is similar to a ‘house of corruption’ and divulged that over Rs. 80 million from a deposited amount of Rs. 100 million had been taken sans any approval from its Executive Board or General Assembly.
Jayasekara added that a spate of charges has been directed at the incumbent NOCSL president and its Executive Board members, but rued the fact that neither the Government nor the Sports Minister were intent on probing those allegations.
He opined that the modus operandi of the NOCSL was to bring about baseless allegations against the Football Federation president Jaswar Umar and a few other competent candidates for its presidency and scupper their chances of winning the 25 April election.
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