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Sri Lanka's Rajapaksa ousted, search begins for next leader

[July 15, 2022] By Uditha Jayasinghe and Alasdair Pal

COLOMBO (Reuters) -Sri Lanka's parliament accepted the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Friday after he fled the country, paving the way for lawmakers to start repairing the island's shattered politics and resume efforts to ease its economic crisis.

After suffering from crippling shortages of petrol and diesel and runaway prices of basic items like vegetables and bread for months under the rule of Rajapaksa and his brothers, Sri Lankans are now waiting for lawmakers to elect a new president on July 20.

Until then, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe will be the interim president although protesters want him gone too. His private residence was set ablaze by demonstrators last weekend and his office stormed this week. Nevertheless, the ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna party on Friday nominated Wickremesinghe to take up the top job full time.

"From this point, we will move to constitutionally appoint a new president," the speaker, Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, told reporters after receiving Rajapaksa's resignation letter the previous night. "It will happen quickly and successfully. I request everyone to support this process."

Rajapaksa landed in Singapore on Thursday, having fled to the Maldives early on Wednesday on a military jet along with his wife and two security guards. Protesters occupied his home and office last weekend after surging past armed guards.

Sri Lanka's top court on Friday barred two of his brothers, former Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and former Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa, from leaving the country without permission until July 28, anti-corruption group Transparency International Sri Lanka said on Friday.

"We are so happy today that he resigned and we feel that when we, the people, come together, we can do everything," said Arunanandan, 34, a school teacher who had been camping at the main protest site opposite the presidential secretariat for the past three months.

"We are the real power in this country."

Abeywardena said he hoped to complete the process of selecting a new president within a week. Parliament would reconvene on Saturday and be notified formally of the vacancy at the top, with a vote for a new president set for July 20.

The influential lawyers' collective, the Bar Association of Sri Lanka, called on parliament to ensure that the election of Rajapaksa's successor is held without delay.

"Members of Parliament must do everything in their power to prevent Sri Lanka from plunging into further chaos and to restore social, political and economic stability," it said in a statement.

The opposition's presidential nominee is Sajith Premadasa, while the potential dark horse is senior lawmaker Dullas Alahapperuma.

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Protestors shout slogans as they vacate the Sri Lanka's Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's office, amid the country's economic crisis, in Colombo, Sri Lanka July 14, 2022. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi

PRESIDENTIAL POWERS

After he was sworn in by the chief justice, Wickremesinghe said he would follow the constitutional process and establish law and order in the South Asian country.

He also vowed to start moves to increase parliament's powers and reduce those of the president, as demanded by protesters.

"This change can be completed by the new president once he is elected by parliament next week," Wickremesinghe said.

Street protests over Sri Lanka's economic meltdown simmered for months before coming to a head last weekend when hundreds of thousands of people took over government buildings in Colombo, blaming the Rajapaksa family and allies for runaway inflation, shortages of basic goods, and corruption.

Serpentine queues outside fuel pumps have become common, while the government has closed schools and enforced work-from-home for office workers to conserve fuel.

The country of 22 million people has nearly run out of dollars for imports and has defaulted on foreign loans.

Headline inflation hit 54.6% last month and the central bank has warned that it could rise to 70% in coming months.

Sri Lanka had begun preliminary discussions with the International Monetary Fund about a potential bailout loan, but these have been interrupted by the latest government chaos.

IMF spokesman Gerry Rice told reporters on Thursday that Fund staff were still in contact with technical-level government officials but hoped to resume high-level dialogue "as soon as possible".

Sri Lanka has received aid and other support amounting to $3.8 billion from neighbor India this year. It has also sought help from China, its fourth biggest lender.

Sri Lanka’s ambassador to China told Bloomberg Television that the country was in negotiations with Beijing for as much as $4 billion in aid, and was confident of receiving it "at some point".

(Reporting by Uditha Jayasinghe and Alasdair Pal; Additional reporting by Devjyot Ghoshal, Sunil Kataria, Sudarshan Varadhan and Shilpa Jamkhandikar; Writing by Devjyot Ghoshal and Krishna N. Das; Editing by Clarence Fernandez, Raju Gopalakrishnan and Mark Heinrich)

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