Sri Lankan national and international finance lawyer ranked highly again by UK FT

Sri Lankan lawyer Aritha Wickramasinghe was ranked No.3 by the international business newspaper Financial Times in their 2016 power list of the world’s most influential LGBT business leaders. Aritha was ranked in the Future Leaders category which he was No.1 in last year alongside industry giants Mark Zuckerberg (founder of Facebook) and Inga Beale (CEO of Lloyds).

Aritha’s consistently high ranking is in recognition of his work to promote diversity and inclusion through business and government across the world. He has been described as an enormously successful campaigner and lawyer having worked for the world’s top law firm Clifford Chance and K&L Gates. The international finance lawyer is a founding trustee of Think Equal, a UN Human Rights Office endorsed education initiative led by critically acclaimed film director and producer Leslee Udwin. 

Think Equal is currently in the process of introducing a new subject into schools across the world which will be teaching children social and emotional intelligence including empathy and critical thinking. The initiative is a ground breaking attempt to change discriminatory mindsets through early childhood education and end the cycle of prejudice and violence within a generation. Think Equal is expected to be rolled out in 30 countries in the coming years and through Aritha’s leadership, Sri Lanka will be the first country in the world to begin the pilot programme from 2017. 

Sri Lanka’s lead in the pilot is credited to the incredible support given by the Government through the initiative’s patron Rosy Senanayake and its ambassador Minister Harin Fernando who join international celebrity patrons and ambassadors including Academy Award Winners Meryl Streep, Susan Sarandon and Helen Mirren and Nobel Peace Prize Winner Professor Muhammad Yunus in supporting the initiative. 

The young lawyer is also a founding director of iProbono’s justice program. iProbono is an online tech platform that now connects over 60,000 lawyers across the world giving free legal help to people and organisations in need. The platform has been responsible for ground breaking legal work and in changing the landscape of delivery of legal services to those most in need. iProbono’s justice program aims to utilise its existing platform to seek justice for those subject to discrimination or violence. 

iProbono has set legal precedence through its work in child rights, rape and human trafficking and is a recipient of the former British Prime Minister David Cameron’s Big Society Award and the Financial Times’ Innovative Lawyers Award.  

Aritha is a writer for the international newspaper Huffington Post and is a strong advocate for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender acceptance and equality. In a statement following his recent global ranking, Aritha said: “Everyone, irrespective of their differences, whether it be race, religion, caste, sexual orientation or gender identity, or any other difference, deserves to be treated equally and fairly. If we are to create a society that is just and free, then we need to create one where people don’t have to be afraid to be themselves. We need a society that values truth and integrity over dishonesty, a society that values love over hatred. Laws that criminalise and discriminate against LGBT people are a dark mark on our society and reflect poorly on our ability to be compassionate and accepting towards others’ differences.” 

Sri Lankan laws continue to discriminate against and fail to grant equality to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons. Although the Mahinda Rajapaksa Government declared in 2014 that LGBT people are implicitly protected from discrimination under the fundamental rights provisions of the country’s existing constitution, little has been done to protect the community from discrimination and violence. In a historic step but decades behind India, Pakistan and Nepal, the Health Ministry together with the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka recently issued guidelines to recognise the gender transition of transgender Sri Lankans and expressly acknowledged the immense discrimination and hardship suffered by the transgender community.  

Sri Lanka’s Public Representative Committee on Constitutional Reform also recently recommended the Government to expressly protect LGBT people from discrimination in the new constitution currently being drafted. 

The corporate sector has also been active in taking steps to protect LGBT people from discrimination. Whereas almost all the multinationals have express policy statements prohibiting discrimination against LGBT persons, John Keels became the first Sri Lankan company last year to expressly include prohibition of discrimination against LGBT persons in their non-discrimination policy. 

In response to the changing business landscape for LGBT people, Aritha said: “Research shows that when employees are forced to hide their sexuality they lose about 30-40% of their productivity. LGBT people make up about 10% of any country’s population. So you can do the maths here. Discrimination is not just bad for society, it is bad for business. If a business wants to grow, if it wants to be competitive, you need to create an environment where your employees are not wasting their energies hiding who they are under the fear of being discriminated. The 21st century has no time or space for businesses that discriminate.”