Board of Directors

Mr. Dharma Dheerasinghe

Chairman

Mr Dheerasinghe, an eminent Economist with a distinguish career of over 40 years in the banking industry was appointed to the Board on December 20, 2011. Prior to his appointment as Chairman on 29th of July 2014, Mr Dheerasinghe was the Deputy Chairman of the Bank. Previously Mr Dheerasinghe was the Senior Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and was also the Chairman of the Monetary Policy Committee and Sovereign Ratings Committee. He was also the Alternate Executive Director for Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Sri Lanka at the International Monetary Fund. Mr Dheerasinghe has published widely in many aspects of economics including debt capital markets and financial globalization and has over 30 referred articles in reputed journals and as book chapters in Sri Lanka and overseas. He has also presented more than 50 papers at international seminars. Mr Dheerasinghe currently serves in the Board of Management of National Science Foundation. He is also a Visiting Lecturer and Moderator/Examiner in Universities of Colombo, Kelaniya, Sri Jayawardenapura and Moratuwa and several professional bodies in Sri Lanka. He has made a significant contribution to the development of the government debt securities market by innovating and structuring key financial instruments and developing its institutional framework. Mr Dheerasinghe is a graduate of the University of Colombo where he has obtained B.Com and B.Phil (Econ) with first class honours. He has obtained M.A.(Econ) from the University of Leeds, UK and is an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Bankers of Sri Lanka and holder of Honorary ACI Diploma.

Mr. Sajeeve Piyaratne

Managing Director/Country Head

Mr. Sajeeve Piyaratne possesses 23 years experience at Commercial Bank of Ceylon. He started his career in branch banking and moved on to be a Business Promotion Officer, promoting remittances and Bank products to Sri Lankan migrants whilst being based in countries such as Kuwait, UAE, Bahrain and Qatar. Sajeeve then moved on to Myanmar to establish the representative office where he initiated the process of establishing the Micro Finance operations as well. Back in Colombo, he gained further experience in Retail Product Department and was in charge of establishing and managing the Direct Sales Team of the Bank.

He holds a Master of Business Administration degree from Cardiff Metropolitan University (UK) and a Post Graduate Diploma in Marketing from the Chartered Institute of Marketing (UK)

Mrs. Sandra Walgama

Non Executive Director

Ms Sandra Walgama is presently overall in charge of the Personal Banking Division, which includes Bank’s network of outlets consisting 261 Branches, Customer Service Points and Supermarket Centers. Having over 38 years of banking experience at Commercial Bank; held numerous Senior Managerial positions, prior to being appointed as Deputy General Manager - Personal Banking.

Ms Walgama is an Associate of the Association of Institute of Bankers Sri Lanka, and Institute of Administrative Accounting UK. She is also a qualified professional from the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment - London in Wealth Management.

Mr. Delakshan Hettiarachchi

Non Executive Director

Mr Delakshan Hettiarachchi accounts for 34 years of banking career at Commercial Bank. Having held numerous Senior Managerial positions including Development Lending prior to being appointed as the Assistant General Manager - Personnel Banking I/SME. Presently he is the corporate head of 5 regions which includes 92 branches.

Mr Hettiarachchi is a fellow member of the Institute of the Bankers Sri Lanka, Master of Business Administration – Cardiff Metropolitan University of, UK and a Resource person ‘Lending Techniques’ & ‘Project Financing’ at the Training Center for Central Bank of Sri Lanka.

Mr. Prins Perera

Non Executive Director

Mr. Prins Perera possesses 31 years experience at Commercial Bank of Ceylon and currently functions as the Chief Treasury Officer of the Bank. Mr. Perera has held many senior positions in the Bank and also served in Bangladesh for a 2-year period where he was instrumental in setting up of the Bangladesh Operations of the Bank. As a prominent member of the corporate management of the Bank, Mr. Perera sits in committees of the Bank, where he actively participates in arriving at key decisions of the Bank.

He is a Fellow of Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CMA) and holds qualifications from Chartered Global Management Accountants, Certified Professional Accountants (Australia) and holds a Master of Financial Economics from University of Colombo

Mr. Sanath Manatunga

Mr Sanath Manatunge is a Fellow of Chartered Institute of Management Accountants – UK (FCMA – UK) and has obtained a Master of Business Administration (MBA) Degree from the University of Sri Jayewardenepura with a Merit Pass. He is also a Fellow Member of the Institute of Bankers – Sri Lanka (FIB), a Fellow of the Institute of Certified Management Accountants of Sri Lanka (FCMA) and a Fellow of the Chartered Management Institute, UK (FCMI). Mr Manatunge is also a member of Sri Lanka Institute of Directors since August 2017.

Mr Manatunge joined the Commercial Bank of Ceylon PLC in 1989. Prior to being appointed as Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Manatunge functioned as Executive Director/Chief Operating Officer of the Bank since 2018. He has held Corporate Management / Senior positions as Deputy General Manager – Corporate Banking, Chief Risk Officer, Head of Credit Risk and Chief Manager - Corporate Banking.

Under Mr Manatunge, the Corporate Banking Division of the Bank experienced a rapid growth in the loan book and in areas such as Trade Finance fee-based income while maintaining the quality of advances. During his tenure as Chief Operating Officer, Mr. Manatunge was heading strategically important business units of the Bank such as Personal Banking, Corporate Banking, Information Technology, Cards, and Digital Banking guiding them to become industry leaders. He has also given leadership and strategic inputs for transformational projects of the Bank such as “SME Transformation”, establishing a long term digital roadmap for the Bank and many projects to improve operational excellence.

Mr Manatunge is also a Director of Commercial Bank of Maldives (Pvt) Ltd., a subsidiary of Commercial Bank of Ceylon PLC since 2016.

He was adjudged the “Chief Information Security Officer of the Year” at the EC – Council Global CISO Forum held in Atlanta – USA in September 2013 in recognition of his outstanding contribution in strengthening and promoting information security practices and IT Risk Management.

He was instrumental in forming the Association of Banking Sector Risk Professionals, Sri Lanka and was the President in the year 2014. He has also served as a Council Member of the Association of Professional Bankers (APB) and a member of the CIMA – “Thought Leadership Committee”.

He was a visiting lecturer for the MBA Degree programme at the University of Colombo. Also a resource person at the Training Centre of Central Bank of Sri Lanka and Institute of Bankers of Sri Lanka.