The Colombo Municipality today blacklisted the Company, Live Events which organised the Enrique Iglesias concert at the CR&FC Grounds. The main stakeholders of the company are former cricketing stars Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardane.

The Municipality said it would not allow the company to organise any other events in Colombo in the future.

Colombo Mayor A.J.M. Muzammil told a media briefing that they would also take legal action against the organizers if they failed to pay Rs.29 million in taxes owed to the municipality.

“We will not allow the company to hold any other event within the Colombo Municipal limits even if it settles the payment owed to the CMC,” he said.

Mr. Muzammil said the organizers did not inform the CMC prior to organizing the event and said the CMC asked them to brief it about the show.

“The CMC could have banned the live concert by Latin America music idol Enrique Iglesias held at the CR & FC Grounds, but we didn’t do so. The ticket holders could have burnt the CR & FC if we did so and would have tarnished the image of the country,” he said

Mr. Muzzammil said all the tickets had to be approved and sealed by the CMC but only a few tickets had been given to the CMC for the approval and sealing.

“The organizers had informed us that they will only issue 7,130 tickets, but we have evidence and information to prove that they had issued more than 10,000 tickets. Therefore they had committed a financial fraud. We will give them a week to settle the balance tax amount,” he said.

Mr. Muzzammil said the organisers of the company should focus on settling the amount owed to the Municipality instead of compensating fans who attended the event. (Darshana Sanjeewa)