Sri Lanka faces political standoff

PRESIDENT REPLACES PRIME MINISTER The move called unconstitutional by the country’s parliamentary speaker.

Sri Lanka’s parliamentary Speaker Karu Jayasuriya has called the president’s sacking of the prime minister to bring a former leader back into power a non-violent coup d’etat.

The political standoff started on October 26, when President Maithripala Sirisena fired Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and replaced him with former president Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Wickremesinghe is refusing to vacate his prime ministerial residence and insists he remains in office until voted out by parliament.

The president suspended parliament until November 14, a move Rajapaksa’s opponents say is aimed at preventing it from rejecting his return to power.

Jayasuriya said in a letter dated November 5 to diplomats and foreign missions the “entire matter was preplanned”.

He said most parliamentarians view the change as unconstitutional. Some were offered bribes and ministerial jobs to support the new government.

He accused Sirisena of acting “contrary to all norms of transparency, decency, democracy and good governance, and contrary to the constitution which he has sworn to uphold and defend”.

Sirisena says he fired Wickremesinghe because he was trying to implement “a new, extreme liberal political concept by giving more priority for foreign policies”.

Rajapaksa, under whose rule Sri Lanka achieved its 2009 victory against rebels from the Tamil minority, is seen as a hero by many. But he has been accused by diplomats of human rights abuses during the war, which he denies.

At least eight lawmakers have deserted Wickremesinghe and accepted ministerial posts under Rajapaksa. –