Gunasena de Soyza
Gunasena de Soyza CMG OBE was High Commissioner for Ceylon in Britain from 1960 until his death. He had previously been the most senior civil servant in Ceylon.Biography
Gunasena De Soyza was born on 20 December 1902 in Colombo, Sri Lanka. He attended Ananda College, Colombo one of the leading Buddhist schools in Sri Lanka for his primary and secondary education and later gained admission to the Ceylon University College, graduating in 1923, and Jesus College, Oxford, where he studied classics.
He joined the Ceylon Civil Service in 1926 and worked in the Cooperative Department, during which time the cooperative movement in Ceylon developed and received considerable recognition. In 1948 he became Permanent Secretary, serving several government departments. His final civil service position was as Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of External Affairs and Defence, from 1953 to 1960. He was then High Commissioner for Ceylon in Britain from February 1960 until his death on 12 October 1961. He was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1948 in recognition of his work for the cooperative movement, and he was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1954.
