NMRA #Datascam: CEO Arrested

COLOMBO (News 1st); The Criminal Investigations Department on Wednesday (8) arrested the CEO of a Private Company that operated the Database of the National Medicines Regulatory Authority, over the disappearance of NMRA files. The suspect is a 40 year old resident from Maharagama, said Sri Lanka Police. Investigations into the deletion of the Drug Regulatory Authority's database stored in the Sri Lankan government cloud system are now being carried out by the CID. A group of backbenchers from the ruling party went to the Drug Regulatory Authority to investigate the incident recently as well. "After the pandemic came to the country, all the equipment and medicines brought to Sri Lanka were recorded manually, not in the usual online system but in a functional manner. So none of that data has been erased. It's all there," SLPP MP Jagath Kumara says. He mentioned that the allegations made against the Government are false, as it was proven that the Government had no part in the scam. "The Chief Officer of the NMRA is not a person appointed by us but an official appointed by the previous Government. Also, another software company is working on this as of present. They say that some of the information were recorded manually and only some of it is online so the data can be recovered." The MP said. Meanwhile, Activist from the Frontline Socialist Party, Pubudu Jagoda said that this erasure is more of a serious issue than initially thought of. " The data was erased on 9th August. What is the progress of the investigations so far? What do the SLPP MPs say? They say that even if some data has been erased, the data relating to COVID-19 is still present.  This erasure of data is very serious," He said. Jagoda added that the Government may even change the data according to their needs and that the same organization in question, manages the employee provident fund data, which could prove to be a difficult problem if deleted. The former Minister of Health, Dr. Rajitha Senaratne says that it can be suspected that the deletion of data is a deliberate act. " Losing a backup is not something that can happen normally. Because the company we used for this was a company that had won awards. The system requires an audit every year. If the Government says that there is a backup, they should have found it already." The MP said. Dr. Senaratne added that removing the contents of the system is as difficult as creating it, and it has to be a deliberate act for anyone to do it. The Secretary of the All Ceylon Medical Officers Association, Dr. Jayantha Bandara says that the Government is a party to a large medicine racket. " We can import a medicine at a very low price and distribute it to the people through the State Pharmaceutical Corporation. In such a situation the Government uses pharmaceutical companies that are loyal to it. This is a mafia. This is why the data on these drugs in the Ministry of Health was deleted recently," He stated.