MONETABRIEF – Sri Lankan cricket legend Kumar Sangakkara's “racist” allegation against Ryanair has ignited a social media debate over discrimination, while an airline that had nothing to do with the controversy apologised to him.
The responses to Sangakkara's post on Wednesday saw X users divided, with many expressing solidarity while others questioned his choice of an ultra-low-cost carrier and whether he expected to be treated like a celebrity in a country not known for cricket.
Swiss, Switzerland's national airline, took the biscuit by apologising to Sangakkara “for the inconvenience you have faced with us”. He did not fly Swiss!
X user @raamki responded to Swiss: “Dude, he didn't even fly your airline. He is complaining about Ryanair, why are you apologising for nothing?”
Sangakkara's complaint against Ryanair came days after the Lankadeepa newspaper reported that the Criminal Investigations Department was continuing an investigation into a land fraud involving his wife.
The Sinhala-language newspaper, through a Right to Information (RTI) request, established that a five-year CID investigation into the alleged Sigiriya land fraud remains unfinished and that key documents had been submitted for scrutiny in November last year.
The Sangakkaras are accused of forging documents to show that they are low-income earners entitled to have a plot of state land transferred from another low-income leaseholder.
Sangakkara has said that a broker, whom they did not know, had falsified documents to arrange the transaction, but the case is yet to go to trial as investigations were still under way, according to the RTI response from the Dambulla Divisional Secretariat.
Explaining the incident at Dublin Airport on Wednesday, Sangakkara said the behaviour of Ryanair gate staff there had been threatening.
“Has anyone experienced discriminatory gate personnel @Ryanair in Dublin? My family and I just did and it was shocking,” Sangakkara said on X.
“The tone of address, the mishandling of procedure and the threatening behaviour were unacceptable for any passenger. My first bad experience in Dublin.”
When X user @IrelandMeda argued that treating everyone exactly the same was not discrimination “even if someone accustomed to special privileges feels slighted by it”, Sangakkara replied that the treatment had been racist.
“When we were told that people like you … with your kind of passports should expect this treatment, and that if we argued against that obviously disgusting comment we would be considered a threat to other passengers and not boarded, that is not treating everyone exactly the same – it is racist,” he said.
@IrelandMeda replied: “It is a budget airline. No one argues.”
London's Daily Mail reported that the dispute concerned a pre-boarding check of travel documents, including visas for entry to the UK.
Ryanair said in a statement: “This passenger refused to provide the required visa documentation when requested by a gate agent carrying out mandatory immigration checks.
“Following completion of these checks and verification of this passenger's eligibility to travel, this passenger travelled on this scheduled flight from Dublin to Bristol (Oct 28).”
Another X user, @Namal0001, added: “Not giving special treatment to the rich and famous is not discrimination.”
Another said: “හොඳ වැඩේ” – “good thing”.
Sri Lanka tech entrepreneur Sanjiva Weerawarana weighed in sayinghe had experienced “discrimination in every part of the West.”
“I lived there for 16 years, traveled back and forth for another 25 and now I'm done. Don't miss it for a bit and will only go for something I need to go to; I see no need to accept being treated like shit,” Weerawarana, a co-founder of WSO2, said on X.
The Daily Mail said Sangakkara now lives mainly in Dorset, having moved there with his family in early 2022, and also owns a property in Galle. (Colombo/Oct30/2026)