The current Prime Minister of Sri Lanka, Ranil Wickremesinghe, takes over as interim president, after the flight of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa this Wednesday (13). The Speaker of Parliament, Mahinda Yapa Abeywardene, announced the changes in the country’s Executive in a press release.
Rajapaksa announced on Saturday, after fleeing the official residence, invaded by protesters, that he would resign from power, as demanded in the protests that have taken over the streets of Sri Lanka in recent months. The president left the country on Wednesday morning, in a national Air Force plane, in the company of his wife and two bodyguards, and landed in the Maldives Islands.
Abeywardene’s announcement made no mention of the president’s official resignation, nor did he indicate how long the prime minister will be in power on an interim basis. Confident that Rajapaksa, in fact, will hand over the post, the opposition parties have already reached an agreement to elect, among the members of Parliament, on the 20th, the new president of Sri Lanka.
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