Mahinda Rajapaksa Arrest Claim Is False, Police and SLPP Confirm

Subscribe to our WhatsApp Channel

After the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) arrested Shiranthi Rajapaksa, wife of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, on October 7, 2026, a post began circulating on social media claiming that the former President had been arrested too. It said Mahinda Rajapaksa was taken into custody when he went to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to give a statement about the “Helping Hambantota” account. Here is the post that carried the claim.

Social Media Posts:

Facebook | Archived Link

We checked whether the claim was true.

Fact-Check:

CIABOC arrested Shiranthi Rajapaksa on Wednesday, October 7, 2026, over an alleged financial irregularity in an account of the “Siriliya Saviya” organisation linked to her. See how mainstream media reported it here, here and here.

The viral post was designed as a news card with the News 1st logo and presented as a Sirasa News 1st report dated October 7, 2026.

No news report or official source confirms the arrest

We found no news report or confirmation from any reliable official source about the claimed arrest. There was also no report that Mahinda Rajapaksa went to the CID to give a statement on October 7, 2026.

News 1st did not publish the report

We checked whether News 1st had published such a report and found that it had not.

Police Media Division said he was neither at the CID nor arrested

To confirm this, we asked the Police Media Division. It said Mahinda Rajapaksa did not go to the CID to give a statement on October 7, 2026, and was not arrested.

SLPP spokesperson called the post completely false

We also asked Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) media spokesperson Sanjeewa Edirimanne. He said the post claiming that Mahinda Rajapaksa was arrested when he went to the CID to give a statement about the Helping Hambantota account was completely false.

Mahinda Rajapaksa was not arrested in earlier investigations either

The steps taken against him in investigations so far were as follows. In May 2022, the Colombo Fort Magistrate’s Court imposed a travel ban on him and 16 others over investigations into the incidents of May 9, 2022. The ban was lifted on May 17, 2023. He also gave a statement to the CID on May 25, 2022, and to CIABOC on May 12, 2026. He was not arrested on either occasion. More on the ban here and here.

However, several of his family members have been arrested. CIABOC arrested Namal Rajapaksa on September 4, 2026, under the SriLankan Airlines Airbus bribery investigation, and he was remanded until September 18 (here). CIABOC arrested his wife, Shiranthi Rajapaksa, on October 7, 2026 (here).

We have previously investigated several false and misleading posts about arrests involving the Rajapaksa family and other politicians.

June 30, 2025: False posts claiming Mahinda Rajapaksa sought the help of the Malwatte chapter to prevent his wife Shiranthi’s arrest: here

September 8, 2026: False posts claiming the Rajapaksa family was receiving support from Tamil political leaders after Namal’s arrest: here

The “Helping Hambantota” investigations ended more than 20 years ago

After the December 2004 tsunami, a private fund called “Helping Hambantota” was set up under then Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa to assist the victims. In 2005, then UNP MP Kabir Hashim complained that Rs. 83 million from the government’s tsunami relief fund had been credited to this private fund.

Mahinda Rajapaksa filed a Fundamental Rights (FR) petition in the Supreme Court seeking to stop the CID investigations. The Supreme Court, headed by then Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva, quashed them, saying the allegations were false and politically motivated. The ruling was later criticized, but the CID investigations ended there. More information here, here and here.

Join us to learn more about our fact-check investigations.

Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Google News | TikTok

Conclusion:

Our fact-check found that the post claiming former President Mahinda Rajapaksa was arrested when he went to the CID to give a statement about the Helping Hambantota account is completely false. No news report or official source confirmed such an arrest, and News 1st did not publish the report shown in the post. He did not go to the CID to give a statement on October 7, 2026.

The Police Media Division and the SLPP media spokesperson also confirmed this. The person CIABOC arrested that day was his wife, Shiranthi Rajapaksa.