In the capital, the Sri Lankan security forces expelled the protesters from the city center, a few hours after the swearing in of the new president Ranil Wickremesinghe, who promised firmness.
Le Monde with AFP
In Colombo, the capital of Sri-Lanka, hundreds of police officers and soldiers in anti-assembly clothes dislodged on the night of Thursday to Friday July 22, the demonstrators installed on the public highway and dismantled the barricades that blocked the entrance main of the presidency secretariat. The protesters, who have been on the spot since early April, had previously announced that they would leave the scene on Friday afternoon.
Witnesses have seen soldiers calling on several people and destroying the tents drawn up along the avenue leading to the presidential palace, while the police blocked the adjacent streets to prevent new demonstrators from arriving on the spot. The new president had previously asked protesters to leave the premises under penalty of being forcibly evacuated. “If you try to overthrow the government, occupy the president’s office and that of the Prime Minister, it is not democracy, it is outside the law,” said Wickremesinghe.
He also established the state of emergency, which gives the armed forces and the police large powers to arrest suspects and keep them in detention for a long period without indictment. On Wednesday, a court had ordered the demonstrators to stop occupying the public highway before the presidency and gathering in another designated place.
“I am a friend of the people”
Ranil Wickremesinghe was elected on Wednesday president of Sri Lanka to replace Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who hurriedly fled his palace taken by storm by thousands of angry demonstrators. The latter has since taken refuge in Singapore, from where he sent his resignation.
The new Head of State, elected for the remaining period of Mr. Rajapaksa’s mandate which ended in November 2024, posted his desire to appoint a government of national unity on Friday. He inherits a country ravaged by a catastrophic economic crisis, characterized by shortages of food, electricity and fuel, and which was lacking on its $ 51 billion debt.
m. WickREMESINGHE is a 73 -year -old cacique that has been Prime Minister six times. He is accused by the protesters of being an ally of the Rajapaksa, a all-powerful family clan in Sri Lanka for more than two decades, which he denies. “I am not a friend of the Rajapakasa. I am a friend of the people,” he told journalists.
Coalition government
In search of a Prime Minister, the new president could appoint his childhood friend Dinesh Gunawardena, an ex-minister of the public service and fervent supporter of the Rajapaka clan. But according to political sources, at least two other personalities are also on the ranks for the position.
m. WickREMESINGHE wishes to bring together a coalition of all training, said a source around him, adding that “some deputies from the main opposition will join the cabinet”.
The head of the opposition Sajith Premadasa, who supported a rival candidate in the election of the president by the Parliament on Wednesday, said Thursday on Twitter Having met Mr. Wickremesinghe and discussed how to shelter the country from new “misery and disaster”. “As an opposition, we will provide our constructive support to efforts to alleviate human suffering,” he said.