Daily Mirror (Sri Lanka)

DATE OF DEBATE TO BE DECIDED TODAY

Situation became tensed at the end as a result of aggressive­ness of MPS

- BY YOHAN PERERA AND AJITH SIRIWARDAN­A

Speaker Karu Jayasuriya yesterday informed Parliament that leaders of the political parties which represent the House will meet today to decide on the date when the

no confidence motion submitted by the joint opposition against Minister of Industry and Commerce, Resettleme­nt of Protracted Displaced Persons, Cooperativ­es Developmen­t and Skills Developmen­t Rishad Bathiudeen.

Speaker assured that the date for the debate on the no confidence motion will be decided today in response to the request made by the joint opposition, JVP and some TNA Members. However, he dismissed a request made by the joint opposition to call up a party leaders meeting yesterday itself.

“We can fix up a date for the motion tomorrow I cannot help if you can’t wait for 18 more hours to get a date fixed. Please don’t use threats,” he told some joint opposition MPS who became aggressive. Situation became tensed at the end as a result of aggressive­ness of the MPS.

Leader of Opposition Mahinda Rajapaksa also requested Speaker to adjourn the sessions and call up a party leader’s meeting to decide on a date. “There is no need to delay as you can simply adjourn the House for some ten minutes and fix a date for the debate,” Mr. Rajapaksa said.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesi­nghe requested the speaker to fix a date for the no confidence motion as there was no issue in doing so. Also he said the proposed select committee could also probe Minister Bathiudeen. He then said an amendment will be brought in to the motion of appointing a select committee to enable probing of any MP.

Joint Opposition MPS Shehan Semasinghe, Kanchana Wijesekera, Padma Udayashant­ha Gunasekers­a,

Indika Anurudhha, Mahindanan­ada Aluthgamag­e and few others insisted that people wants justice done to the Easter Sunday Bomb victims, and therefore, the no-confidence motion should be taken up.

TNA MP S. Viyalendra­n said justice has to be meted out to the victims of Zion Church bomb Blast as well. TNA MP Charles Nirmalanat­han said some action should be taken against Minister Bathiudeen as he adopts dictatoria­l approach when it comes to dealing with his ministeria­l purview. This he said he has so many institutio­ns under his ministry.

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