In his statement, SLPP presidential candidate Gotabaya Rajapaksa claims that the Mahinda Rajapaksa government released 90% of military occupied land, after the end of the war. To verify this claim, we consulted data published by the Secretariat for C

In the above statement, State Minister of Transport & Civil Aviation provides statistics to claim that there has been a large increase in the present government’s budget commitment to free healthcare, and that it is as a significant proportion of s

Minister Bathiudeen claims creditable export performance by citing USD 1.3 billion in export revenue from three sub-sectors. We checked this claim using data available from the Sri Lanka Export Development Board (EDB). Even though export statistics a

Minister of Housing, Construction and Cultural Affairs Sajith Premadasa’s statement suggests that the gap in income share between the richest and poorest quintiles in the country is 50% of total household income.

In the above statement the MP claims that by passing the Active Liability Management Act the government can: 01.Obtain foreign loans without any annual limit. 02.Borrow any amount outside [the provisions of] the budget.

On 11 July 2019, Mawbima reported MP Rajapaksa making the above statement which claims with specific numbers that starting with 560,000 candidates sitting the G.C.E. (O.L) exam, only 28,000 (that is about 5%) succeed in gaining university entrance.

We consulted two sources to verify this claim. (1) The Secretariat for Coordinating Reconciliation Mechanisms (SCRM), and (2) Sixth periodic report submitted by Sri Lanka to the United Nations Human Rights Committee.

In the above statement, the prime minister is making a negative attribution to Mahinda Rajapaksa’s presidency by citing a fall in export share of GDP by 12 percentage points, from 30% to 18%.

On 19 June 2019, the Daily FT newspaper quoted the state minister of finance making the above statement in Parliament. Since the statement does not specify a time period for this claim, FactCheck evaluated it for each year since the change in governm

FactCheck investigated the MP’s claim in three ways: through (1) information in the public domain; (2) directly requesting MP Jayakody for his source of information; and (3) publicly inviting verification of this claim on

On 4 June 2019, Divaina reported President Maithripala Sirisena making the following claim: The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) and Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) incur losses in the tens of millions [of rupees] per day.

On 15 May 2019, Dinamina reported Minister Ranjith Madduma Bandara making the following statement: Deaths reported as being due to drowning are about 800 annually.

On 28 May 2019, Divaina reported that MP Vijitha Herath made the following claim:

On 22 May 2019, Dinamina reported State Minister of Finance Eran Wickramaratne making the following statement. Sri Lanka’s tourism sector accounts for 5% of gr

On 02 April 2019, Lankadeepa reported that MP Udaya Gammanpila made the following claims in parliament:

Minister of Finance Mangala Samaraweera made the following claims: Foreign reserves were $7.6 billion, equal to four months of imports;

On 28 March 2019, Dinamina reported President Maithripala Sirisena making the following:

On 04 February 2019, Mawbima quoted the following statement made by Minister of Health, Nutrition and Indigenous Medicine Rajitha Senaratne: “Within the world healthcare system, the fact that the best health service is provided by Cuba and Sri Lank

On 10 April 2019, Dinamina reported that Minister of Justice and Prison Reforms Thalatha Athukorale made the following statement: There are close to 22,000 inmates in prisons. Of them, a large number are serving sentences that are less than two years

On 27 March 2019, the Daily News reported Minister of Tourism Development, Wildlife and Christian Religious Affairs John Amaratunga making the following claims:

In the nine years I was in power, I increased the GDP per capita of this country by a multiple of three. In that period, the economic growth rate was 7.4%.

On 26 October 2018, the Divaina reported MP Anura Priyadarshana Yapa making the following claim.When a mobile phone user in our country pays Rs. 5,000 [as the mobile phone bill], Rs. 1,600 of it goes towards paying taxes.

Sri Lanka, a pearl in every possible sense - the wildlife, a proud and long history, amazing beaches and of course, us, the people. We are in our own way a nation of achievers, heroes, legends and the ever resilient.