As a cabinet minister, Sri Lanka’s beleaguered prime minister is under increasing pressure to quit, while other senior party members back public protests calling for resignations over the country’s deteriorating economic crisis.
On Saturday, Media Minister Nalaka Godahewa declared his support for the thousands of people protesting outside President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s office, demanding that he and other members of his powerful family resign.
Sri Lanka is experiencing its most severe economic crisis since its 1948 independence from British domination, with months of prolonged blackouts and severe food, gasoline, and other vital shortages.
The problem has spurred nationwide demonstrations, with irate protesters camped outside Rajapaksa’s office for almost three weeks.
Under duress, the president removed two of his brothers, Chamal and Basil, as well as his nephew Namal, from the cabinet earlier this month, but protestors dismissed the changes as merely cosmetic.
Godahewa, a former Rajapaksa supporter, suggested the president should fire his elder brother, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, the family’s leader, and replace him with an all-party interim government.
After the police shooting of a protester on Tuesday, he claimed the administration had lost its legitimacy.
Godahewa claimed that he had offered his resignation to President Rajapaksa, but that it had been rejected.
“We need to restore political stability to successfully meet the economic crisis,” Godahewa said in a statement on his Facebook page.
“The entire cabinet, including the prime minister, should resign and [there should be] an interim cabinet that can win the confidence of all.”
Several senior ruling party members, including Dullas Alahapperuma, a former media minister and cabinet spokesman, have also asked the premier to step down.
“I urge the president to appoint a smaller cabinet with a genuine consensus representing all parties in parliament for one year maximum,” Alahapperuma said on Saturday.
Meanwhile, security was beefed up in the central town of Rambukkana on Saturday, ahead of the funeral of 42-year-old Chaminda Lakshan, who was shot dead by police while protesting rising fuel costs.
For months, food, fuel, and power have been rationed, and the country has experienced unprecedented inflation. Hospitals are in desperate need of essential medicines, and the government has called for donations from residents around the world.
Finance Minister Ali Sabry, who is in the United States negotiating a bailout with the International Monetary Fund, warned on Friday that the South Asian country’s economic position will likely worsen significantly further.
Sabry warned reporters, “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.” “The next few years are going to be excruciating.”
