Sri Lanka lifts curfew for festival, PM picks cabinet
Wickremesinghe holds talks with banks focusing on aid for supply of medicine, fertiliser and food; police arrest over 230 people for violence
Sri Lankan authorities lited a nationwide curfew on Sunday for an important Buddhist festival, but celebrations were muted as the island nation’s new premier struggled to find his footing and tackle a worsening economic crisis.
A countrywide stay-home order has been in place for most of the week ater mob violence let 9 dead and over 225 wounded, sparked by atacks on peaceful demonstrators by government loyalists.
Protesters across the Buddhist-majority nation have for weeks demanded the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa over Sri Lanka’s worst-ever economic crisis.
Police have arrested about 230 people in connection with last week’s violence, police spokesman Nalin Thalduwa said on Sunday.
“Police stations country-wide have been ordered to increase patrols and continue vehicle and people checks. There are more arrests taking place as investigations into the violence continue,” he said.
Sunday marks Vesak, the most important religious event on Sri Lanka’s calendar, which celebrates Buddha’s birth, enlightenment and death.
Many public and private buildings were flying the multi-coloured Buddhist flag, while residents visited temples dressed in all-white for Sunday’s festival.
The government has declared a two-day holiday and announced it was liting the curfew for the day without saying when or whether it would be reimposed.
But the ongoing crisis prompted the government to cancel its plans to celebrate the festival, which had been scheduled at a temple in the island’s south.
“Given the economic situation of the government and other constraints, we are not having this year’s state festival at the Kuragala temple as planned,” a Buddhist Affairs ministry official said.
The official said Buddhists were free to hold their own celebrations, including the mass meditation and Buddhist sermons traditionally organised during the festival.
Worshippers usually set up soup kitchens, lanterns and “pandal” bamboo stages bearing large paintings depicting stories from Buddha’s life.
“Everybody knows that it is Lord Buddha’s special day today,” said Chamila Perera, a housewife in the capital Colombo.
“We are hoping good things will happen,” she said. “But I’m feeling very sad.”
Newly appointed Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe is struggling to form a unity government ahead of Tuesday’s parliamentary session, the first since he took office.
Opposition leader Sajith Premadasa has already formally rejected an overture to join the new administration.
“The demand from the streets is that President Rajapaksa should step down,” Premadasa said. “We will not join any government with him in it.”
But he added that his party would not block legitimate “solutions to the economic problems” in parliament.
Rajapaksa on Saturday appointed four new ministers, all from his own Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) party, but the all-important finance ministry remains vacant.
Official sources said the new prime minister could take the finance porfolio to spearhead ongoing negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for an urgent bailout.
Wickremesinghe, 73, has already met diplomats from Britain, the United States, Japan, China and India to seek financial aid.
He held discussions with the World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), his office said in a statement on Sunday.
“The discussions with the organisations focused on assistance for the issues facing the supply of medicine, food and fertiliser,” the statement said.
“All these people are hand-in-glove,” Fareena, a resident of the capital Colombo, said of the new premier.
“When one goes, they bring another one of their guys in,” she said. “But to us, they are all the same.”
Long queues stretched outside the few fuel stations that were still open on Sunday as motorists waited for rationed petrol.