Sri Lanka Rugby’s Rotten Script Plays On – Politics strangles the game once more, with Priyantha Ekanayake pulling the strings while the Sports Minister turns a blind eye
It was supposed to be different under the National People’s Power (NPP) government. After decades of the Ranil–Rajapaksa era, where political interference seeped into every corner of sport, there was a faint hope that change would finally arrive. Instead, the bitter truth is that the same old manipulations, the same backdoor deals, and the same faces still grip Sri Lanka Rugby by the throat.
For years, officials have repeated the tired mantra that the game needs “young blood” to take it forward. But behind closed doors, it is the same entrenched figures fighting tooth and nail for their pound of flesh, desperate to hold on to power by any means necessary. At the heart of this debacle is Priyantha Ekanayake to some still remembered mockingly as “Priyanthi,” but now parading as the government-appointed Chairman of the National Sports Council. Backed by Sports Minister Sunil Kumara Gamage, Ekanayake has virtually hijacked Sri Lanka Rugby, making decisions to suit himself and bending the game to his will.
Even the Working Task Force (WTF), a body of five respected officials appointed by Minister Gamage to run the sport until the next Annual General Meeting and elections on 8 October 2025, has been reduced to nothing but a bunch of toothless tigers. Their authority, their credibility, and their purpose have been stripped away, because all roads now lead to Ekanayake and his accomplice, the Sports Ministry’s Private Secretary Darshana Waragoda.
It was only recently that the pair were exposed for interfering in the appointment of Asanga Seneviratne as Chairman of a Tournament Committee alongside six others for the upcoming Asian Sevens in Colombo. That scandal was galling enough. But what followed has left the rugby fraternity shaking its head in disbelief.
The WTF had duly nominated Group Captain (Rtd) Nalin De Silva, the Ministry’s appointed point of contact for rugby, to represent Sri Lanka at the World Rugby General Assembly in England (24 September 2025) and the Women’s Summit (25–26 September 2025). Travel dates were set from 23 to 28 September. Yet, with the stroke of a pen, Priyantha Ekanayake simply decided he wanted Imthie Marikkar to go instead. Using the Minister’s authority as his cover, Ekanayake ordered the WTF to replace De Silva with Marikkar, turning an international responsibility into a joy trip for his chosen man.
The irony? Marikkar, who was parachuted into Sri Lanka Rugby by Ekanayake, has achieved nothing of note. His legacy so far is flying down a sixth-string New Zealand Under-85 side to Colombo, while under his watch Sri Lanka has yet to win a single rugby game. He now heads to England to sit in rooms meant for administrators of stature and skill whilst mocking the very spirit of the General Assembly’s regulations.
Meanwhile, Sri Lanka Rugby is broke. Local coaches go unpaid, players are left without financial support, and yet there is money to drag in a foreign sevens coach from New Zealand to prepare for the Asian Rugby Sevens. It is a grotesque picture: foreign hires funded while local talent is starved. Gibbs is understood to be paid US $10,000 a month with free food and accomodation. It is also reliably understood that the WTF has been kept in the dark regarding his appointment.
The WTF itself is no ragtag body. It includes two highly decorated Senior Deputy Inspectors General of Police, a senior legal mind, and the President of the NOCSL (by virtue of rugby’s Olympic status). The fifth member, Ravi Wijenathan, is a close ally of Ekanayake, a reminder that even within the Task Force, the Chairman has placed his loyalists. Yet none of this matters. The WTF, for all its dignity, has been neutered into nothing more than paper-pushers, carrying out orders dictated by Priyantha Ekanayake and Darshana Waragoda.
This is not governance. This is not administration. This is government interference at its ugliest, dressed up as “sports management.” And it reeks of the same corrupt playbook that destroyed public faith during the Ranil–Rajapaksa years. Rugby, once the pride of the nation, has now become just another pawn in a cynical political game.
The President Must Act
The time for excuses is over. If Minister Sunil Kumara Gamage refuses to rein in his rogue NSC Chairman, then the responsibility falls squarely on President Anura Kumara Dissanayake to intervene. He can either sack Ekanayake and restore integrity, or sack the Minister himself for allowing this disgrace to flourish under his watch.
Anything less will confirm the worst fears of players, fans, and administrators alike that even under the NPP banner, Sri Lanka’s sport has changed in name only, while the same dirty politics poisons it from within.
