Mobitel a fully owned subsidiary of Sri Lanka Telecom and headed by President Maithripala Sirisena’s brother Pallewatta Gamaralalage Kumarasinghe Sirisena, unblocked the website www.mahinda.info belonging to the former President Mahinda Rajapaksa that Mobitel had blocked earlier last Friday.
The website is run by the Mahinda Rajapaksa Information Center.
Sources close to the newly appointed Telecommunications Minister Harin Fernando said that the Minister had received a colossal number of calls yesterday regarding this blockage. Colombo Telegraph is unaware if the Minister intervened to have the website unblocked. The website’s blockage was removed late last night around 8. 15, shortly after the Minister was informed. However Colombo Telegraph failed to obtain a quote from Minister Fernando as several calls made to him proved to be futile.
Meanwhile officials from the Mahinda Rajapaksa Information Center had published a story airing their woes regarding the periodically blocking the website faced and continues to do so since last Friday; “Prior to the General Elections we were experiencing a similar problem and when we were going to take legal action regarding this matter, Mobitel then unblocked the website. However the blockade continued a few days later and then we informed the Elections Commissioner. The website was unblocked once again and again blocked. However once Colombo Telegraph carried the story yesterday, it was unblocked yet again last night.”
Yesterday officials of the Mahinda Rajapaksa Information Center called the Mobitel hotline and recorded the conversation with their call center agent.
The call center staff member of Mobitel stated that under an order received from the Telecommunication Regulatory Commission the website had been blocked.
The sound track is found below;
President Maithripala Sirisena gave a specific order to lift direct online censorship as one of his first acts in power. Websites can be “prohibited or be subject to supervision and control” under S.69 of the Sri Lanka Telecommunications Act 1991 – but only under ministerial authority, and under a publicly announced order.
No such order was made to replace the directive issued by President Sirisena in January.
Related posts;
Mobitel Blocks Mahinda Rajapaksa’s Website
Keep The Promise, Protect Internet Freedom In Sri Lanka: Worldwide Free Expression Orgs Urge Mangala
Photo – screenshot yesterday before being unblocked;
Photo – screenshot yesterday after being unblocked;
Kumara / September 14, 2015
[Edited out]
/
Regi / September 14, 2015
TIT for TAT
/
shankar / September 15, 2015
I prefer two tits.
bah to that humbug hypocrite samuel jayaweera.
/
Pot Shot / September 14, 2015
This should not have happened. Why should the TRC block this website? MS & RW please wake-up!
/
Lanka Watch / September 15, 2015
Pot shot – Both are awake! but they should not go to do things that they cannot hold on to it.There is nothing they held on so far, on what they promised .This shows that MR still has some political clout
/
Point of View / September 14, 2015
Look who is complaining ? Shameless bugger !
/
Kasun / September 15, 2015
If your parents dead at a LTTE bomb blast, you would never be ashamed as you would never born.
/
Point of View / September 15, 2015
Ask Lasantha’s kids, Prageeth’s kids, Thajudeen’s family, SF family and all other victims who suffered during the last 10 years, how they feel ?
Just because you fought a terror group does not give you the right to terror your subjects and plunder the country !
He will always be the shameless, uncivilised, uncultured, uneducated head of state we ever had in SL !!
/
vis8 / September 17, 2015
Swallowed a lot of media baloney, eh? go get a life, you gullible fart.
/
Point of View / September 17, 2015
How much are you paid ? May be just a laptop ! Keep up the good work !!
/
Yasin / September 19, 2015
Watch what you are saying.
MR, whatever wrongs he and his siblings, relations and friends did is overseen by the public at large. MR still was able to command a huge percentage of votes in the presidential and parliamentary elections.
People may be foolish in voting for him but the results shows that there
is a large number of voters who still follow him, with cult reverence.
Yet he was a good man misguided by those near and dear to him.
Like the great saying ” a fool and his money are soon parted”, Here it can be said that a fool and his power are soon parted.
The sad end was that MR fell victim of his own follies and appeared like the king who lost his clothes.
/
Indra / September 28, 2015
MR was nothing but an [Edited out]
/
Native Vedda / September 17, 2015
Kasun
“If your parents dead at a LTTE bomb blast, you would never be ashamed as you would never born.”
Could you translate the above typing into English, Sinhala or Tamil.
/
Yasin / September 19, 2015
Please do not write rubbish.
Comment only on the subject matter.
/
BBS Rep / September 15, 2015
CT must find out who gave such orders to block this web site or for that matter any website. You must probe more and find out whose order was being followed. Media should be free even though we know all what Mahinda and co have to say are utter lies.
/
Snowden Edward Asange / September 15, 2015
ugh……….Mahinda this Mahinda that..can we leave him aside and move one….he is just an MP now and should not be given too much prominence.. A LOT of things happen to Average Joes..of SL..is all that made a big issue of? NO! so let him be irralevent…
We have much more important things at hand to care for that being informed of someones website..IS this news worthy? CT? I bet not….
/
EW Golding / September 15, 2015
Chairman TRC is President MS’s brother; this should not be held against him. He may be a decent man but he does not have the stature, competence and independence that the post requires. MS and MR are still afraid to appoint persons of this caliber (with a few exceptions) because they feel insecure and prefer YES-men – not as bad as MR times of course when it was not pliable appointees but poodles who were put in place.
/
lipwe / September 16, 2015
But Howcome MR able to appoint election commisioner
/
Wera / September 15, 2015
It is high time CT ignored the travails and the hardships of the Rajapakshe clan. These are the scoundrels that set fire to newspaper printing offices and radio stations and indulged in the whole sale blockade of large number of websites including this one. They also used surrogates to buy newspaper and television ownership which resulted in the wholesale monopolising of ALL the media in the country. Let the Rajapakshes and their websites go rot in hell. We need to move on.
/
Vanguard / September 15, 2015
Are websites so powerful as to undermine government power? No wonder the past government had them blocked. It is all clear now. They had a good reason it turns out.
Thanks TRC.
/
Abu Mukarram / September 15, 2015
When Baappa went fcid the policeman saluted him. Who knows MR himself ordered the blockage and the officers abided by the order thinking MR is still the king. Its not unlikely
/
vis8 / September 17, 2015
Still hallucinating, eh? [Edited out]
/
Missinpage / September 15, 2015
Page not found!
Ranil’s Agenda In New Delhi
Ranil’s Agenda In New Delhi
By R. Hariharan – Sri Lanka Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe is neither a stranger to
/
Lanka Watch / September 15, 2015
Abu – You are absolutely correct. Ranil still rules the roost and there
is no one to oppose him among the bureaucrats due fear of revenge. This
culture should change as MR will cry foul every time something goes against him and govt. officials will dance to his tune.
/
Lanka Watch / September 16, 2015
Abu – Sorry, correction. 1st line should read MR instead Ranil …..
/
paul / September 16, 2015
Just shows we are getting the same medicine in a different bottle…
/
Tamil from the north / September 16, 2015
Not only you should block his cell but also remove all his civic rights in the country just like what he did to his opponents. Dirty bastard!!!
/
Point of View / September 16, 2015
Totally agree ! He should taste his own medicine !!
/
ponil / September 16, 2015
Ponseka is the dirty bastard, because he betrayed the SL army by saying they shoot to LTTE who carried white flags at the final war. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oggCA19H9Oc
Still SLA sufferting in Geneva due to that stupid statement. SF should be hang to death.
Admin, as you approve the above comment of “Tamil from the north ” let this Sinhalese to keep his replay.
/
Tamil from the north / September 17, 2015
@Ponil, where were you hiding when SF (Ponseka) was fighting the LTTE. Where was Gota the hero of Gamay Sinhalese during the height of the war (was he in the U.S., pumping petrol into cars).
If you commit a crime you need to pay for it. There will be no flexibility shown on that.
/
Tamil from the north / September 17, 2015
@Ponil, most Tamils don’t have a problem with the white flag LTTErs being mowed down. These are the top ranking fellows who pushed the rank and file fighters of the LTTE to fight or commit suicide and when their time came to either fight or die they ran in there with white flags. It serves them right.
Also learn a bit of the English language before you spew your rubbish out. SF was the mastermind behind the final destruction of the LTTE and Ranil (who you call Ponil) is the initiator of the destruction of the LTTE by breaking the East and North factions of the LTTE.
/
Saman Rohan Ranasinghe / September 22, 2015
What Happened to The Sri Lanka Telecom. Where is the Sri Lanka Telecom now, Where it has gone. Previously Sri Lanka Telecommunication System Maintained and Run by Sri Lanka Telecom.
/
Satyam / September 22, 2015
Trying to justify this kind of things saying ‘Mahinda also did’ is utterly foolish. People in Sri Lanka elected MY3 because he promised to ‘CHANGE’. If these guys are doing this kind of things after promising a ‘Yaha Palanya’ it is an utter disgrace. Government should be bold enough to find out who ordered the blockade, reveal his/her name and tell the public what action taken against the person. That is how ‘Yaha Palanaya’ should prevail. We the voters are not happy with ‘words’, we want to see ‘deeds’.
/