Controversial Inspector General of Police (IGP) Deshabandu Tennakoon was remanded until 3 April by the Matara Magistrate’s Court, yesterday (20). This, despite pleas by his legal team to grant him bail, raised concerns about his safety and security while in remand custody. Tennakoon, who was subject to an arrest warrant in connection with a shooting incident near a hotel in Pelena, Weligama in 2023, surrendered to the Court by submitting a motion yesterday (19), after evading arrest for nearly 20 days.

The Attorney General’s Department, with seemingly newly found vigour, lambasted the manner in which Tennakoon evaded arrest and arrived in Court, even though he remains a senior police officer, giving his colleagues in kaki, the slip. We hope that the Attorney General’s Department and all their prosecutors will take this example to heart and pursue justice in all high-profile cases which they prosecute.

It is well understood that Tennakoon's appointment should never have happened. Former President Ranil Wickremesinghe highlighted the nature of impunity in the political culture of Sri Lanka by appointing Tennakoon, who was found guilty by the court of torture of a suspect in custody, and had multiple allegations regarding neglect linked to the tragic Easter Sunday bombing of 2019, and in relation to a number of custodial deaths, particularly the ones linked to the Colombo Crimes Division (CCD). Some political observers are of the view that Wickremesinghe appointed Tennakoon, who also was at the forefront of a mob which assaulted protestors encamped in Galle Face green during the ‘aragalaya’ protest movement, to appease the Rajapaksa political clan which Tennakoon is said to be loyal to. The move was a challenge to the Judiciary and Wickremesinghe, in his usual elitist brash style, decided to put the Executive on a collision course with the Judiciary because he was emboldened by decades of impunity.

This is the same type of impunity, which national leaders have long practised, which trickles down and is copied by State officials. The culture of impunity is deeply rooted in the Police Department. The Police often claim that the suspects, who are supposed to be handcuffed, attempted to hurl a grenade, or shoot at them with a weapon that was concealed during a field excursion to ‘show where evidence is hidden’. The two were killed while being in the custody of a special police unit, which was led by then DIG Tennakoon, who later was appointed as the IGP by President Wickremesinghe.

Custodial deaths, forced confessions, and the Sri Lanka Police, have a long-standing relationship. The practice of ‘beating’ out a confession, is nothing new to most law enforcement forces which were modelled under colonial policing objectives. In many former colonial States, such practices have long been prohibited and waned out with new policies and a change in the culture. Sri Lanka, it seems, has missed the bus on that change. The continued custodial deaths, and that of preventable ‘encounter deaths’, particularly concerning counter-narcotics enforcement and the arrest of those suspected to be ‘hit men’, indicates that the law enforcement agencies prefer to take shortcuts, opting to be the judge, the jury and the executioner – instead of enforcing the law.

Such occurrences are not rare, in 2023, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) arrested three, over their alleged complicity in the custodial death of a female housekeeper, who died while in police custody and is suspected to have been abused during interrogation. The victim was alleged to have robbed a residence of an affluent and influential family, which some believe is the reason that several Police officers have given her a ‘tough treatment’ to force a confession. It is alleged that the Police offered Rs. 10,000 to the husband of the woman to not press charges against the cops involved. The matter is now before the Courts and is ongoing.

If Sri Lanka is to improve its governance system and reform the State sector while building public faith in State institutions, the political culture and State practices of impunity need to end. This Government, with a strong public mandate for change, stands at a fork in the road and should choose to end such practices, through reforms, regulations, and practice.