Five members of SriLankan Catering’s management staff, a fully owned subsidiary of SriLankan Airlines had been promoted to positions not in the approved organisational chart or the cadre in 2015.
This was was revealed before the Presidential Commission of Inquiry on SriLankan Airlines (SLA), SriLankan Catering (SLC) and Mihin Lanka yesterday.
SLA’s Group Assurance and Advisory Services Senior Manager Mahesh Nanayakkara testifying before the commission said that these promotions were done by SLC’s then Chief Executive Officer Sarath Fernando disregarding the Human Resources and Remuneration Committee (HRRC), which is a subcommittee of the Board of Directors appointed in 2014.
The witness said this is a violation of Terms of Reference of the HRRC.
These five officers who were in the grades 11, 09, and 08 were promoted one grade up respectively and had been given salary increments of very high per centages, it was also revealed. The witness, referring to the HRRC report dated January 12, 2016 also pointed out that the promotion letters were granted to these five executive level officers in July, 2015 backdating the effective date till April, 2015.
He said although the HRRC made recommendations to rectify this misconduct, no follow up action was taken at least to recover the money given to them. SLCs Human Resources and Administration former manager Chinthaka Kulatilake was also one of the five members of the management staff, who was promoted to the post of Head of Human Resources and Administration by the CEO.
The commission had convened him also for the testimony yesterday.
When asked from him as to how the appointments to the designations that are not in the cadre could be approved by them, his reply was that the CEO is the sole authority to decide on promotions of senior managers and executives. The commission will further inquire into the matter.