‘Jana Balaya Colombata’ protest is only the first step – Mahinda Rajapaksa (English)
Posted on September 5th, 2018
Former President Mahinda Rajapaksa says that today everybody in the country – from the poor man to the businessman – are hurt due to the actions of the ruling government.
Addressing supporters at the Joint Opposition rally at Lake House Roundabout in Colombo, he also accused the government of secretly introducing bill which look to divide the country.
Not only are they dividing the country, they are burdening the public even more by continuing to impose taxes,” he said.
He charged that democracy is slowly disappearing from the country which is slowly moving towards a dictatorship. Rajapaksa also accused the government of postponing Provincial Council elections.
Rajapaksa said that today the country’s President or Prime Minister have can go to Jaffna and deliver speeches criticizing him because he gave them that right.
This is only the first step in our journey,” the former President said, referring to the protest campaign.
Tens of thousands of opposition supporters marched in Colombo to demand the government step down. The protest march and public rally titled Jana Balaya Colombata” was organized by the Joint Opposition on Wednesday (5).
September 5th, 2018 at 6:20 pm
Allow me to air public anger in a sharp comment.
Holding people as a human shield to achieve political ends is a form of terrorism. Office workers, patients and school children going to far away homes were most affected by this protest. Drawing a large number of buses, clogging trains and other transport means on a working day added to their misery. If any attendees were employed, it reduced their productivity. It is not acceptable. This type of protests must be held on public holidays.
The conduct of police is commendable. No one was killed by the police.
No government (right or wrong) must be sent home by protests. Elections must be the only way to do that. The Special Court prosecuting allegedly corrupt and other felons must not be cowed down by protests. Please act responsibly and think of innocent civilians.
UNP and JVP did the same during Mahinda’s time and before. Totally unacceptable.
Politicians come and go and live and die, but the nation and the national economy must be protected.
September 6th, 2018 at 2:24 am
It is a peoples’ right to protest against a Government which is not democratic and ignores the peoples suffering under financial , social and political burdens the government has put upon them. This government completely ignores the Parliament and its members and carries on with what they think is right without taking into consideration the difficulties people undergo in a almost a dictatorial regime.
How can people show their dissent with this government otherwise than by a public manifestation ? The Speaker of the Parliament qnd the Opposition led by Smpanthan are not people friendly and there is no posibility of opposing the steam roller procedure of the governmzent.
It is great that people did not accept things blindly and rose to oppose the government by coming out onto the road. Which had taken place in several countries below and changed governments. It is the people who should change regimes, not foreign interventionists. May the Triple Gem protect the people of Sri Lanka.
September 6th, 2018 at 2:47 am
These thickskinned Yahapalanaya clan determined to ruin Sri Lanka will continue despite these massive manifestation of the people against them.
People should continue manifestation untill the Sirisena the President decides to sack the Prime Minister and change the Government.
September 6th, 2018 at 3:27 am
Dear Dilrook!
Protest is Democracy at Work
For many Sri Lankans, public protest is sometimes the only meaningful avenue for democratic expression.
Some critique’s depictions of the yesterday’s protests in Colombo, and around the country have given in to old-fashioned fear mongering.
For many Sri Lankans, public protest is sometimes the only meaningful avenue for democratic expression.
Protests are not about violence or disruption day to day working pattern in the city. They are expressing their grievances where there are no other ways and means to convey the message to the undemocratic repressive government which has a habit of postponing the local elctions . However, blaming all protesters or their supporters for the actions fundamentally misrepresents the nature and importance of protests.
Take for instant, your own country of residence, America, the very movements that brought this nation’s practices into concert with its best ideals—the civil rights movement that brought down Jim Crow laws of racial segregation, the labour movement that resulted in regulations against child labour, the women’s suffrage movement, and even the Boston Tea Party,
America’s earliest and perhaps most defining moment of public protest—were, in some quarters, widely viewed at the time as threatening and disruptive.
In all of these cases, opponents could—and frequently did—seize on the violent actions of lone individuals or an aberrant minority in order to distract, disregard, and deny the democratic claims of citizens who raised their voices for change.
September 6th, 2018 at 6:39 am
We should never condemn or criticize the citizens who try to protest their government using their democratic rights.
Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, changed the world through their peaceful protest marches, not by waiting for the corrupted governments and politicians to change.
Sri Lanka is at a cross road and the present government is taking the country to its grave by changing the constitution to please their colonial masters, funded by the pro-LTTE Tamil Diaspora, and NGOs’.
Public display of massive protests are absolutely necessary to show this corrupted Yahapalanaya, that people are sick and tired of this government for deceiving masses for the last three years.
More power to the protesters….
September 6th, 2018 at 6:46 pm
I fully support public protests, particularly against this incompetent regime.
However, those must happen in the weekend or on public holidays.
It makes no sense whatsoever to hold them on weekdays that disrupt public life and economic activity. In my view, the JO/SLPP suffered loss of popularity by disrupting public life and after the publication of the aftermath of the protest. Over 60 persons lying on roads, passed out after drinking, were treated. Loads of garbage was cleaned. Protestors merrily enjoying alcohol was also showed to the nation.
I see a clear difference in protests organized by Mahinda in 2003 and this protest organized by politically inexperienced people.
I don’t believe in “sending a government home” by protests. Parliamentary elections are for that purpose.
September 7th, 2018 at 6:43 am
You need not have political experience to protest. This story of people found fallen after consuming liquer is a story being spread by the UNP and its +supporters to discredit the Organisers of the Manifestation, as having brought the crowds with promise of offering liquer.
There may have been some who drantk but not on liquer issued by the Organisers. It is UNP which is well known for giving a packet of rice and a bottle of arrack to bring thugs to their manifestations; They were called BathGottas.
There cannot be special days or specific areas for manifestations. Manifestations have led to Prime Ministers to resign and Governments to fall.
This stipid yahapalana goons will never learn . The people know now how the UNP spread lied , by their villification of the Manifestation of the 5 September. Sirisena has still not made a statement on it, getting unnecessary involved in a question of hanging people. What a President we have in Maithripala Sirisena ?