{"id":143183,"date":"2015-04-22T00:00:34","date_gmt":"2015-04-21T18:30:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=143183"},"modified":"2015-04-30T01:52:02","modified_gmt":"2015-04-29T20:22:02","slug":"sirisena-should-call-a-snap-election-and-appoint-mahinda-as-prime-minister-gotabaya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/sirisena-should-call-a-snap-election-and-appoint-mahinda-as-prime-minister-gotabaya\/","title":{"rendered":"Sirisena Should Call A Snap Election And Appoint Mahinda As Prime Minister: Gota"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Maithripala+Sirisena&amp;x=13&amp;y=4\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Maithripala Sirisena<\/span><\/a> has been elected President for six years. Therefore, he will have to continue. But he can quickly call for parliamentary elections and appoint <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Mahinda+Rajapaksa&amp;x=12&amp;y=5\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/span><\/a> as Prime Minister. Together, they should put the country back on its feet by providing a functioning government with people committed to achieving goals,\u201d says the former Secretary to the Ministry of Defence <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Gotabaya+Rajapaksa&amp;x=8&amp;y=5\">Gotabaya Rajapaksa<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Mahinda-Gota.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-124531\" src=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Mahinda-Gota.jpg\" alt=\"Mahinda Gota\" width=\"450\" height=\"319\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Mahinda-Gota.jpg 450w, https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Mahinda-Gota-300x212.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 450px) 100vw, 450px\" \/><\/a>Speaking to P.K. Balachandran of <em>The New Indian Express <\/em>last night<em>, <\/em>Mahinda Rajapaksa&#8217;s\u00a0younger brother,\u00a0Gotabaya claimed that Sri Lankans want Rajapaksa back.\u00a0\u201cSupport for him has grown beyond the 5.8 million votes he got in the January Presidential election,\u201d Gotabaya said.<\/p>\n<p>According to Gotabaya, Sri Lankans are clueless as to who is in charge of the country.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOn the one hand there is Prime Minister <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Ranil+Wickremesinghe&amp;x=13&amp;y=3\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Ranil Wickremesinghe<\/span><\/a> who is running the government. But on the other hand, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Chandrika+Kumaratunga&amp;x=11&amp;y=6\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Chandrika Kumaratunga<\/span><\/a>, Champika Ranawaka and Rajitha Senaratne also claim to be in-charge. However, what is clear to the people is that there is no functioning government. All economic development projects initiated by the Rajapaksa government have been brought to a standstill. In the construction sector alone, over 100,000 workers have been rendered jobless by the stoppage of projects\u201d Gotabaya told the <em>New Indian Express<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Because officials are being hauled up before investigative agencies for alleged \u201cprocedural lapses\u201d, no civil servant wants to take decisions. \u201cIf this situation is allowed to continue, the entire economy will collapse and it will be very difficult to put it back on its feet again,\u201d Gotabaya warned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":133932,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,1,6969,2375],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-143183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-news","category-popular-stories","category-stories"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.3 - 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