President Gotabaya Rajpaksha along with his wife fled Maldives hours before his resignation. Consequently, Ranil Wickremesinghe becomes the acting President.
Image Source: bangkokpost
Protestors dashed into Prime Minister’s Office after President flees
The Country’s Prime Minister’s Office declares a state of emergency on Wednesday. The decision came at the pinnacle past to flee of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. He along with his wife fled to Maldives hours before his resignation.
Earlier, Rajapaksa had promised the people that he would resign on Wednesday. However, before the wee hours; he flew to another country seeking shelter and ignoring the deteriorating condition of both people and the nation.
Hence, in technical terms, he is yet to retire.
Prime Minister, now also the acting President, Ranil Wickremesinghe called on the military to do whatever was required to establish law and order.
After the President and Prime Minister’s house stormed on the weekend. It’s already five days since protestors seek control of the Presidential palace. While anti- governmental protestors had set ablaze the private house of Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, to which he also reacted publicly.
“Hitler-like mindset” torch buildings, the Prime Minister had asserted on Monday, reacting to protestors burning his house. He said this house was the only house he had in Sri Lanka and also in the world.
The present situation in Sri Lanka
On Wednesday, the Prime Minister’s Office got stormed into. Thousands of demonstrators gathered outside the office and began trying to make their way into the Prime Minister’s Office.
Police found it abstruse to stop or take control of the uncontrollable crowd that tried to get into the Prime Minister’s Office. Security forces tried their full effort to control the demonstrators by using several means. They even threw tear gas for it, but all things went in vain. Ultimately, demonstrators were victorious in making their way into the Prime Minister’s Office.
Media channels under attack
Protestors even barged into the Sri Lankan National TV Office, shutting down its operations. Thereafter, Sri Lankan national TV channel goes off-air. State-run TV station- Rupavahini was compelled to terminate its transmission after protestors broke into it’s premise
What do Sri Lankans want?
People demonstrating at several places in Sri Lanka want the present Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to resign. They don’t want Wickremesinghe to become the acting President. Demonstrators demanded the resignation of the Prime Minister and that a newly elected government should take control of the current situation.
Protestors shouted, ” Go home Ranil, Go home Gota ! ” as they demonstrated outside the office.
Video of Protestors protesting outside the Prime Minister’s Office.
Prime Minister asserts mob
Wickremesinghe called the protestors to be “fascist”. “I have ordered military commanders and the police chief to do what is necessary to restore order,” Wickremesinghe said in a TV address. “Those who stormed into my office want to stop me from discharging my responsibilities as acting president.”
“We can’t tear up our constitution. We can’t allow fascists to take over. We must end this fascist threat to democracy,” he added.
Police imposed a nationwide curfew in the nation until early Thursday morning, 5:00 am, to control the ongoing protests. The protests erupted as the crisis prevailed for months over the 22 million people of the island nation.
What Led to such a Crisis
For months, Sri Lankans have been going through inflation in a manner that even the prices of basic commodities skyrocketed. The condition is such that the government had earlier ordered the closure of offices as well as schools. Schools were closed because paper for writing could not be afforded.
This neighbor island of India has a lot of foreign debts to pay, especially to China. In April, it counted $51 billion and is currently in talks with the International Monetary Fund(IMF) to come out of this ongoing situation.
Sri Lankans blame Rajpaksha and the family for the country’s mismanagement and hardships.
