Mayor of Colombo A.J.M. Muzammil has instructed the Internal Auditor of the Colombo Municipal Council to conduct an immediate investigation into the suspicious torching of a large number of important documents of the CMC.

Around 6,000 documents belonging to dates between the years 2008-2013 were reportedly taken to the Borella cemetery and set ablaze last evening.

Upon being notified of this several CMC members, both from the ruling party and opposition, had immediately visited the location and managed to save a portion of the documents.  

They had handed over these partially burned documents to the Mayor this morning.

Documents pertaining to recruitments from 2010-2011 and municipal assets were among them, Colombo Mayor Muzammil told Ada Derana.

He stated that the officials responsible had strayed from the usual procedure of destroying documents and that an investigation is being carried out into this.

The recruitment officer of the CMC’s Urban Department, Shelton Perera and Colombo Municipal Secretary H.D.C. Janaki are being investigated over their alleged involvement in the incident, he said.

Shelton Perera is also currently holding the post of Acting Head of the now dissolved emergency raid unit.

It is said that various irregularities had taken place during the recruitment of security officers for the Municipal Council.

However, the Mayor said that they had been instructed to destroy the documents using the proper procedures by the Municipal Commissioner Bhadrani Jayawardena.

Muzammil said he had inspected the order paper for destroying the relevant documents and that it had also contained document which should not have been destroyed.

He state that the documents they had managed to save are being analyzed and that several important documents are among them.