Transparency, good business

From Daily News News Desk

Transparency International Sri Lanka (TISL) is receiving massive funds from a number of foreign agencies and foreign government bodies including Norway, Germany, US and EU for the past many years. Though full details about its activities are little known TISL had received Rs. 137,523,386 (according to the current rupee values of the dollar and the Euro) up to the end of last year alone.

Among the funding sources of the TISL are Foreign Ministry of Norway, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Germany, Swedish International Development Agency who had funded projects like strategic planning Rs. 31,995,787 and another Rs. 9,764,573.

But how these funds were spent or in what sector the strategic planning was done with such a large sum of money is not known.

The funding was mainly done in US Dollars and Euros said to be for various projects like 'Enhancing demand for accountability in local governance' with funding over Rs. 12.3 million, 'Kurunegala capacity building project' with over Rs. 1.5 million.

According to the TISL, the funds received so far from various foreign government and foreign agencies by TISL in the year 2010 was Rs. 69,189,458.