Recently, we heard about the death of a well-known businessman in connection with the forcible confiscation of his property by a financial institution.
At the same time, the General Secretary of the Leasing and Debtpayers’ Association, Asanka Ruwan Pothupitiya is participating in a social media discussion and revealing many such incidents.
He says that the biggest problem facing the people at present is the difficulty in paying the lease installments and it has been a year and eight months but so far no relief has been given to the people through the Central Bank.
Although the Central Bank has said that it will grant grace periods by issuing circulars, many leasing companies are still arbitrarily exploiting the public and collecting fines.
He also pointed out that in the circular issued by the Central Bank on 06.10.2021, the leasing companies were not paying attention to the interest on 100% interest.
The circular issued on 08.09.2021 states that consideration should be given to give a grace period till 31.12.2021 to pay the existing lease loan installments in non-bank financial institutions and banks and this statement issued by the Independent Central Bank states That is not fair at all.
The circular issued on 06.10.2021 also states that the maximum interest rate should be increased from the minimum of 5.5% to the maximum of 11.5% to 15% and this does not mention any concession.
At the time of the appointment of the Governor of the Central Bank, this parade law was repealed for six months and before that the Act was to be submitted to the Cabinet for amendment but was later repealed by the Governor of the Central Bank.
He has pointed out that the recent death of businessman Somasiri Fernando, who passed away recently, is also a result of this cancellation.
He had committed suicide when he heard that the bank had taken over all the properties of the businessman when the law had been repealed for six months.
Last year alone, about 170 innocent people in our country lost their lives as a result of these microfinance loans. He also stressed that the country has been taken to another abyss.
He concluded that the people of this country should be given some relief and that the government should intervene or take action to solve this debt burden to some extent.
He has revealed a number of such issues during this period and the program can be viewed below.
