{"id":96051,"date":"2019-12-06T16:22:50","date_gmt":"2019-12-06T23:22:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=96051"},"modified":"2019-12-06T16:22:50","modified_gmt":"2019-12-06T23:22:50","slug":"condolence-message-on-the-passing-away-of-hon-ranjith-de-zoysa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/12\/06\/condolence-message-on-the-passing-away-of-hon-ranjith-de-zoysa\/","title":{"rendered":"Condolence Message on the Passing Away of Hon. Ranjith de Zoysa"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em><strong>MEDIA RELEASE Mahinda Rajapaksa Prime Minister <\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n<p>I was\nshocked and saddened to hear of the untimely passing away of Ratnapura District\nParlimentarian Hon. Ranjith de Zoysa while receiving treatment at a hospital in\nSingapore. He was a hero to the political forces that came together to form the\nJoint Opposition and later the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna after January 2015.\nHe rose to national prominence as one of the most outspoken and fearless\nopponents of an unsuccessful and repressive government. A qualified\nagriculturist himself, Hon. Ranjith de Zoysa was vocal on matters affecting the\nfarming community particularly in the sphere of minor export crops. It is a\nblow to the movement he was part of, the people he represented and to me personally\nthat fate would take him away at the very moment of our triumph.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hon.\nRanjith de Zoysa was educated at the Rahula National College,Godakawela and\nlater went on to complete a Diploma in Agriculture. He was an Associate Member\nof the Sri Lanka Agriculturists Association. He entered politics in 1997 by\nbeing elected the Chairman of the Rakwana Pradesheeya Sabha. In 2002, he became\nthe Leader of the Opposition of the Rakwana Pradesheeya Sabha. He entered the\nSabaragamuwa Provincial Council in 2004 and served as the Provincial Minister\nof Agriculture and later as the Provincial Minister of Health. He entered\nParliament in 2010. He was an upright politician who could not be wrongly\ninfluenced or misled by the blandishments of power and position. He was only 57\nwhen he passed away, but by all accounts his was a life well lived, in the\nservice of the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wish to\noffer my heartfelt condolences to his wife Muditha de Zoysa, his son Lakith and\ndaughter Mihintha and the people of Rakwana and the Ratnapura district on the\nuntimely demise of Hon. Ranjith de Zoysa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mahinda\nRajapaksa<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Prime Minister <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MEDIA RELEASE Mahinda Rajapaksa Prime Minister I was shocked and saddened to hear of the untimely passing away of Ratnapura District Parlimentarian Hon. Ranjith de Zoysa while receiving treatment at a hospital in Singapore. He was a hero to the political forces that came together to form the Joint Opposition and later the Sri Lanka [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mahinda-rajapaksa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96051"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96051\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}