By Lakmal Sooriyagoda
The Supreme Court yesterday ordered the status quo of CIESOT to be restored to the status prior to an interim order delivered on March 10 2014, resulting in the previous board of CIESOT being reappointed.

Issuing a press statement, Ceylinco Insurance PLC said the Supreme Court affirmed that CIESOT was a legal and a duly constructed Trust belonging to the employees of Ceylinco Insurance and that it is in accordance with the Trust Ordinance of  Sri Lanka.

The order was delivered yesterday, pursuant to motions filed by employees of Ceylinco Insurance claiming that their rights have been affected by previous orders of the Supreme Court.

The share fund was hotly contested throughout the past few months with counter claims to the effect that the fund belonged to former Chairman of the Ceylinco group Lalith Kothelawala, and therefore belonged to depositors of the fallen Golden Key Credit Card Company. 

The Supreme Court judgment was delivered by a five bench panel headed by Chief Justice K. Sripavan, Eva Wanasundara, Rohini Marasinghe, Sisira de Abrew and Buweneka Aluvihare during the hearing of the case SC/FR/191/2009, filed by the depositors of the Golden Key Credit Card Company in the year 2009.   
CIESOT which was created in year 2000, holds a 22.86 percent stake of Ceylinco Insurance PLC and is managed by CIESOT (Pvt) Limited as the trustee company.

The press statement said that the main objective of formulating the said scheme was to reward employee loyalty, and accordingly dividends have been paid to employees every year since year 2000.

The same statement said that employees of Ceylinco Insurance hailed the judgment and Employees’ Union had been quoted as saying that “justice has prevailed.”

Once dissolved, CIESOT is expected to distribute the money amongst the eligible present and ex- employees of Ceylinco Insurance PLC, who are the beneficiaries of the trust.  

According to Ceylinco Insurance, the position of the employee and the number of years in service will determine the share entitlement and all employee categories starting from peons and drivers to the senior management  will be entitled  to receive the benefits.