SLPP MP Namal Rajapaksa told Parliament on Thursday that his party’s campaign against the government will begin on 12 September and that nothing will stop it.
He said the party had sought a particular playground in Anuradhapura for its rally and was refused, the Daily Mirror reported.
“We asked for a certain playground for our rally in Anuradhapura, but we were denied. This suppression cannot deter our efforts.”
“You cannot scare us by showing us prisons.”
The remarks were made from remand custody
The Daily Mirror reports the statement as ordinary floor speech. It omits the circumstance that gives the second quotation its force: Rajapaksa is in remand custody.
He was arrested and remanded on 4 September after appearing before the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption over the Airbus matter, and has been attending Parliament by prison bus under permission granted for him to sit while in custody. The SLPP has characterised the remand as political revenge.
A reference to prisons from a member currently held in one is not a rhetorical flourish, and readers of the Daily Mirror’s account alone would not know it.
The venue refusal
Rajapaksa did not name the ground, the authority that refused it, or the reason given. Public playgrounds in Anuradhapura are generally under local authority or Provincial Council control, and permission for political rallies is routinely sought from the relevant council and the police. Which body declined the request — and on what grounds — is unstated.
Rajapaksa made a related allegation on Tuesday about the SLPP being refused a rally ground, which remains unanswered by any authority.
Not reported
The Daily Mirror does not say what form the 12 September campaign will take, whether it is a single rally or a sustained programme, where it begins, or what its stated demands are. It does not name the refused ground or the refusing authority, record any government or police response, or say whether an alternative venue has been offered or sought. It does not note Rajapaksa’s custody status.
No other verified newsroom had filed on the remarks at the time of publication. Ada Derana’s site has returned a CloudFront block on every attempt across recent cycles and could not be checked.
Update, 11 September: the rally is going ahead, and the SLPP calls it the start of a “people’s struggle”
On the eve of the event the SLPP confirmed it will hold a mass rally in Anuradhapura on Saturday, answering the question of whether the venue refusal would stop it. It will not.
National Convener D.V. Chanaka said the rally is being held to protest the government’s failure to fulfil promises made to farmers and the public, and to press it to deliver on those commitments, the Daily Mirror reported.
SLPP Jaffna District Organiser Geethanath Cassilingam gave the campaign its framing in a separate interview, calling Saturday the beginning of a sustained “public struggle” rather than a one-off protest.
“Two years on, the Government seems to cover up its failures by carrying out political revenge on the opposition. The people are struggling to survive, while the Government has failed to provide the relief it promised.”
The charges the SLPP is running on
Cassilingam set out the platform, timed against the second anniversary of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s election:
- Foreign investment. He alleged that investors sign memoranda and nothing follows — “Files remain untouched in ministries” — citing the proposed Sinopec investment as still in limbo.
- Jobs. He said the failure to attract investment has left talented young Sri Lankans still looking for work overseas.
- Farmers and the cost of living. He said farmers outside Colombo face rising input costs and delayed payments while the government considers importing rice, sugar and fish.
- Taxation. He said high taxes against low incomes have closed small businesses and squeezed others.
- Security. Against a background of shootings and grenade attacks, he criticised the President’s remarks about consulting a fashion design company on a new police uniform: “While our Treasury is being robbed by unknown hackers, the President is more keen to talk about a new police uniform.”
What is answered and what is not
This fills in the demands and the form of the campaign, which the original report left open. It does not resolve the venue question. Neither item says where in Anuradhapura the rally will now be held, whether the refused playground was granted after all, or whether an alternative site was provided — and no authority has answered Rajapaksa’s claim that permission was denied.
Neither report mentions that Rajapaksa, who announced the campaign, remains in remand custody, and neither carries a government response to any of Cassilingam’s allegations. Both items are Daily Mirror; no other verified newsroom had filed on the SLPP’s pre-rally messaging at the time of writing.
Update, 12 September: the rally went ahead, and Mahinda led it
The campaign proceeded on Saturday on a council ground in Anuradhapura. Former President Mahinda Rajapaksa attended in place of his son, who remains in remand custody, alongside Wimal Weerawansa, Udaya Gammanpila, Tiran Alles and MP Ramanathan Archchuna.
The venue question is only partly resolved: the Daily Mirror places the rally at the Anuradhapura Municipal Council Grounds and Hiru News at the Anuradhapura Urban Council grounds, and neither says whether this was the ground originally refused. No authority has yet answered Rajapaksa’s claim that permission was denied.
Full coverage: Mahinda Rajapaksa joins SLPP’s ‘Janasatana’ rally in Anuradhapura.
