At a time when corruption is rampant and the so-called soothsayers and self styled messiahs are helping themselves with untold riches to take the pathetic story of Sri Lanka to the world community, the country’s top Formula racing driver Dilantha Malagamuwa has had enough of spending his own money to showcase the island and instead has decided to appeal to well-wishers to join in the cause.
Malagamuwa, a businessman with ties to Japan, has been racing his machine on the international Asian circuit for many years pasting his car with the Sri Lanka flag and now realizes he is out of pocket to go where no Sri Lankan has gone before and compete on European tracks that would cost him 300,000 Euros or nearly a hundred million Sri Lankan rupees.
Malagamuwa (left) opens out to the media flanked by Ashan Silva
(Pic: Rukmal Gamage)
Malagamuwa claims the money will be for the maintenance of two Lamborghini cars and entry fees for six races at the GT2 European Series during the six month period. He received government patronage in the past but now feels abandoned to make an appeal for what he says will be his hardest challenge.
Malagamuwa has now discovered another Sri Lankan racer in Ashan Silva who he wants to groom as his replacement and claims the two will be the only competitors from Asia to race against hardcore European drivers in France, Italy, Belgium, Germany and Spain starting in the first week of April and culminating in the second week of October.
“Sri Lanka is looking for tourism and tourist dollars and here I am willing to showcase the country on the world’s best stage and in motor racing. But I am no longer in a position to do it on my own and need the support of sponsors and the government,” Malagamuwa said at Press conference on Wednesday flanked by Ashan Silva.
Malagamuwa sees himself as the only individual Sri Lankan to showcase the country through sport using his own funds and now feels abandoned that he has to continue in the same vein without any commercial godfathers.
“Sport is the only thing that we can showcase to the world and after doing so much for the country (Sri Lanka) spending my own money in the past, I can no longer do this on my own,” said Malagamuwa.
Describing himself as a “humble yet highly influential true Sri Lankan” Malagamuwa counts 190 podium finishes and eight championship titles on the international circuit while being felicitated by the Japanese government in 1997 for becoming the first non-Japanese Asian to compete in the Formula Nippon F3000 which is the highest level of racing in the land of Cherry Blossoms.
He was also a goodwill ambassador for the Little Hearts Foundation, a charity organization for child healthcare at the Lady Ridgeway Hospital in Colombo.
