{"id":166907,"date":"2016-08-28T00:00:12","date_gmt":"2016-08-27T18:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=166907"},"modified":"2016-08-29T12:15:43","modified_gmt":"2016-08-29T06:45:43","slug":"slfp-convention-rajapaksa-to-duck-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/slfp-convention-rajapaksa-to-duck-out\/","title":{"rendered":"SLFP Convention: Rajapaksa To Duck Out"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former President <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?s=Mahinda+Rajapaksa&amp;x=8&amp;y=4\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Mahinda Rajapaksa<\/span><\/a> has decided not to attend the 65th Convention of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_135895\" style=\"width: 245px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/Mahinda-Matugama1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-135895\" class=\"size-full wp-image-135895\" src=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/Mahinda-Matugama1.jpg\" alt=\"Mahinda Matugama\" width=\"235\" height=\"285\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-135895\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Mahinda Matugama<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Rajapaksa, who was initially on the fence whether or not to attend the convention, which will be held in Kurunegala, his constituency, will avoid the convention, and instead travel to Kuala Lumpur where he will take part in the Asia Pacific Parliamentarians&#8217; Union convention. Several other Joint Opposition MPs are also expected to join Rajapaksa on the trip. The Parliamentarians convention will be held from September 1 to 4.<\/p>\n<p>Sources said that even though Rajapaksa has decided to give the SLFP convention a miss, he has however not disapproved other Parliamentarians of the Joint Opposition from taking part in it, but instead he has informed them to take a decision based on the sentiments of the voters, in their respective vote bases.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is the people who should tell you\u2019ll whether or not to go,\u201d Rajapaksa had reportedly said.<\/p>\n<p>The 65th SLFP Convention will be held on September 4 in Kurunegala under the patronage of President Maithripala Sirisena, who is also the SLFP leader.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":148980,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2186,1,2375],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-166907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-featured-news","category-news","category-stories"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.3 - 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