Guwahati: The Sri Lanka government on Wednesday proclaimed a state of emergency Following President Gotanaya Rajapaksa’s late Tuesday night flight to the Maldives, news agency AFP said citing sources within Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s office.
Fresh protests out in the island nation on Wednesday after hundreds of incensed people gathered outside the Colombo office of the prime minister to demand his resignation as well.
Protestors have demanded that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa step down after failing to save the nation from its worst economic crisis in living memory and today they made a similar demand of the Prime Minister pointing out that the country’s constitution requires he take over when the president resigns.
“Because the Prime Minister automatically assumes the presidency in the event that the President steps down, we want the PM to step down. The public wants them both gone,” a former advisor to the Sri Lanka government told news agency ANI.
“Police fired tear gas shells at the demonstrators as a kind of response. Army soldiers entered.”
Images published by ANI showed large crowds of demonstrators gathered outside Prime Minister Wickremesinghe’s office resembling the Saturday night raid on President Rajapaksa’s home in Colombo.
One can hear the protestors yelling and booing.
Another video shows protesters coming face-to-face with heavily armed and armoured military personnel stationed outside the prime minister’s home.
Some of the demonstrators can be heard saying “go, go” in response to other protesters yelling out the names of the president and prime minister.