In the noise and distraction of Sri Lanka’s daily political theatre, something far more sinister is unfolding quietly, stealthily, and dangerously. Beyond the headlines, beyond the carefully planted controversies that dominate evening talk shows and social media chatter, lies a seemingly calculated attempt to blur and ultimately erase the line between Government and State.
Sri Lanka, probably for the first time, is witnessing Government excess of a new kind, one that is deeper, systematic, and far more corrosive than past excess: State capture. If unchecked, it risks hollowing out Sri Lanka’s democracy until all that remains is the façade of institutions, elections, and courts in form, but stripped of substance and independence.
The term ‘State capture’ may sound academic, but its implications are all too real. State capture occurs when a political entity goes beyond traditional corruption like bribes, kickbacks, patronage, etc., and instead seizes control of the entire set-up where laws, regulations, appointments, tenders, and verdicts are manipulated to serve the interests of the ruling clique. South Africans learnt this bitter lesson under Jacob Zuma and the Gupta family. Post-Soviet states fell into the same trap when oligarchs bent entire systems to private ends. If recent events are anything to go by, Sri Lanka appears to be witnessing the familiar signs of State capture.
What makes the danger greater is the failure of those tasked with guarding democracy. The Opposition and much of the media have surrendered initiative and, instead of setting the agenda, they chase after distractions. Throw a scandalous bone and both Opposition benches and newsrooms pounce, while the real action – appointments, budget allocations, institutional reshaping – takes place quietly behind closed doors. This ‘marrow bone culture’ is the perfect cover for State capture. A proactive Opposition would be exposing systemic risks; an independent press would be digging into the quiet transfer of power from State to party. Instead, both chase headlines while democracy erodes.
The tragedy is heightened by irony. The National People’s Power (NPP) coalition swept to power promising a clean break: no political appointments, no patronage, and State institutions run by professionals. It was this promise that resonated after decades of corruption and abuse under both the Rajapaksas and the UNP.
Yet, within a year, the NPP has violated its own pledges. The post of Treasury Secretary, traditionally reserved for one of the most senior State administrators, has been handed to an NPP MP and former Deputy Minister of Finance. The Secretary to the President, the apex figure in the State bureaucracy, is a handpicked loyalist imported from the Customs Department – an institution already in the eye of a storm over the release of 323 containers. The new Customs Director General is the very man who presided over that scandal. The new Director General of the Bribery Commission is alleged to be a former member of the JVP’s Legal Division, raising questions about whether an institution that should be fiercely independent has instead been compromised. A former CID Chief, linked to the mishandling of post-Easter Sunday attacks investigations, has been recalled from retirement to head the Police’s most sensitive arm. Even the Ministry of Public Security has as its Secretary a political appointee who openly campaigned for the NPP.
These appointments certainly don’t qualify to be termed as isolated lapses. Taken together, they form a pattern of replacing independent officials with party loyalists – the essence of State capture. Perhaps the most alarming front is the Judiciary. Judges have been shuffled without explanation. A magistrate who ordered the arrest of three powerful Government figures over real estate fraud was abruptly transferred. Such action can be inferred as interference and undermines the last line of defence in any democracy.
While appointments tell one story, budgets tell another. The 2026 Appropriation Bill presented in Parliament on Friday (26) provides the clearest evidence yet of consolidation. The President’s allocation has soared nearly 400% – from Rs. 2.7 billion this year to Rs. 11 billion next year. Even more troubling, a quarter of the entire Government spending budget, amounting to Rs. 1.1 trillion out of a total of Rs. 4.4 trillion, now lies directly under ministries controlled by one individual – the President. The supreme irony is that this is coming from a party that pledged to abolish the presidency altogether. Instead, the presidency is being fattened beyond recognition.
What needs to be kept in mind is that capture corrodes more deeply than corruption. Under corruption, a bribe may tilt a contract. Under capture, the entire tender process is redesigned so that only one winner exists. Under corruption, a law may be bent. Under capture, the law itself is rewritten to serve the rulers. Corruption weakens democracy but capture hollows it out completely. Recently when an influential Cabinet Minister who feigned poverty all this time but was found to be a multi-millionaire was questioned about his wealth in a television interview, his blunt response was to tell the interviewer not to question him on the subject.
For citizens, the cost of State capture is not abstract, with the immediate consequence being collapse of accountability with auditors, regulators, and watchdogs becoming mere rubber stamps. Policy will likely be distorted when economic reforms, tax breaks, and contracts are written not in the public interest but in the interest of a clique.
Power becomes entrenched when institutions that should guarantee alternation of Government instead guarantee incumbency. Trust erodes when citizens conclude that ‘all are the same’ and that erosion of trust usually creates space for authoritarian alternatives. Sri Lanka, still reeling from an economic crisis, can least afford such erosion. A state captured by a political entity cannot rebuild credibility abroad, restore fiscal discipline at home, or inspire confidence among its people, leave alone much-needed investors.
The pattern is a familiar one. Russia and Hungary offer sobering parallels of democracies hollowed into shells while maintaining the outward appearance of elections and parliaments. South Africa lost billions to Gupta-linked capture, setting back its development for years. Sri Lanka has seen shades of this before. The Rajapaksas treated the State as family property. The UNP indulged in cronyism under the banner of reform. The NPP rose as the alternative, promising to break this cycle. Yet within months of taking office, it has begun walking the same path. The betrayal is doubly dangerous because disillusioned citizens will not simply shift to another party; many will turn away from democracy itself.
Whatever the regime may claim in its defence, the signs of capture are clear: politicised appointments, purported judicial interference, a bloated presidential budget, and a distracted Opposition and media. Democracy rarely dies in a single blow. More often it is smothered slowly with new appointments here and revised budgets there, until the very institutions meant to check power become instruments of it. By then, the coup is complete.
The way forward is vigilance. The Opposition must move beyond reactive theatrics to systemic scrutiny. The independent media must rediscover its investigative muscle instead of chasing headlines. Civil society, academia, and ordinary citizens must demand transparency, question appointments, and follow the money. Sri Lanka’s democracy has survived war, insurgency, and economic collapse. But it cannot survive if what is remaining is hollowed out by capture. The late American jurist, Learned Hand, once said: “Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.” This is what Sri Lanka is staring at if its citizens are not vigilant.
( Note 01 -The statement in this editorial ‘The new Customs Director General is the very man who presided over that scandal. The new Director General of the Bribery Commission is alleged to be a former member of the JVP’s Legal Division, raising questions about whether an institution that should be fiercely independent has instead been compromised.’ has been challenged by the ruling party NPP)
( Note 02: Ceylon Today is owned by businessman and opposition politician Dilith Jayaweera – SLB)