Colombo, Oct 19 (Bureau) President Ranil Wickremesinghe is as corrupt as any other politician and he cannot save Sri Lanka from the present economic crisis, the leader of the country’s largest leftist group said in remarks published on Wednesday. Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the Janatha Vimukti Peramuna (JVP) also said that the mass protests in Sri Lanka failed to achieve its aim of capturing power although it forced President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee “for want of proper leadership and planning”, The Island newspaper reported. Dissanayake has said ‘Aragalaya’, as the mass protests against Sri Lanka’s unprecedented economic mess was known, failed “for want of proper leadership and planning though it compelled Gotabaya Rajapaksa to give up executive powers”.
He pointed out in a television interview that although the Rajapaksas’ power collapsed, “they were able to quickly regain, and consolidate political power, by installing UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe to complete the remainder of Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s term”. The JVP leader added that the incumbent Wickremesinghe administration was as corrupt as successive Rajapaksa administrations. He felt that having forced Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee Sri Lanka, the protest should have been diverted towards Parliament and force the government to dissolve it and call for a fresh election. Because of this failure, the Rajapaksas succeeded in regaining political power, he added. Commenting on former Army chief and MP Sarath Fonseka’s assertion that the ongoing anti-government struggle may lead to another armed rebellion, the JVP leader emphasized that his party wouldn’t go on that path again. The JVP launched insurgencies in 1971 and 1987-89, leaving thousands dead.
Asked to explain the JVP’s strategy, Dissanayake said they believed that the government should be relentlessly pressed until it called a general election. “We’ll secure power through elections,” he said, warning the electorate not to be deceived by the Rajapaksas and Wickremesinghe again. Dissanayake alleged that the the leader of the main opposition Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB), Sajith Premadasa, “was also part of the utterly corrupt political party system that ruined the country”. “(Premadasa) as well as a vast majority of those around him cannot absolve themselves of waste, corruption, mismanagement and irregularities though they now pretended to be paragons of virtue,” he added.