Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa will step down next Wednesday, the country’s parliament speaker said on Saturday, bowing to popular pressure after a day of violent protests in which protesters stormed the president’s official residence and set fire to fire at the Prime Minister’s house in Colombo.
The announcement came after a dramatic escalation in months of largely peaceful anti-government protests over a dire economic crisis on the Indian Ocean island of 22 million people.
There was no immediate word from the president himself.
President Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena said in a video statement that Rajapaksa had informed him that he was resigning from his post.
“The decision to step down on July 13 was made to ensure a peaceful transfer of power,” Abeywardena said. “Therefore, I ask the public to respect the law and keep the peace,” he said.
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News of the president’s decision sparked an eruption of celebratory fireworks in parts of Colombo.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has also said he is ready to step down to make way for an all-party government, his office said in a statement late Saturday.
It was not yet clear whether this would calm popular anger.
Throughout the day, soldiers and police were unable to contain a crowd of protesters demanding Rajapaksa’s resignation and blaming him for the country’s worst economic crisis in seven decades.
Neither Rajapaksa nor Wickremesinghe were in their residences when the buildings were attacked.
Inside the president’s home during Saturday’s protests, a Facebook live feed showed hundreds of protesters, some draped in the national flag, filling rooms and hallways.
Video footage showed some of them splashing around in the pool, while others were sitting on a four-poster bed and sofas. Some could be seen emptying a chest of drawers in images that were widely circulated on social media.
Hundreds milled around the grounds of the whitewashed colonial-era residence, with few security personnel in sight.
Rajapaksa had left the official residence on Friday as a security measure ahead of a rally scheduled for the weekend, two Defense Ministry sources said.
Reuters could not immediately confirm his whereabouts.
Later on Saturday, video footage on local news channels showed a huge fire and smoke coming from Wickremesinghe’s private home in an affluent neighborhood of Colombo. His office said protesters had started the fire.
There were no immediate reports of injuries in the fire. Wickremesinghe had moved to a safe place, a government source told Reuters earlier in the day.
At least 39 people, including two police officers, were injured and hospitalized during the protests, hospital sources told Reuters.
The country is facing severe foreign exchange shortages that have limited essential imports of fuel, food and medicine, plunging it into the worst economic crisis since independence in 1948.
Skyrocketing inflation, which hit a record high of 54.6% in June and is expected to hit 70% in the coming months, has caused hardship for the population.
The decision by the president and prime minister to step aside came after Wickremesinghe held talks with several political party leaders to decide what steps to take after the unrest.
“Wickremesinghe has told party leaders that he is ready to step down as prime minister and make way for an all-party government,” his office said in a statement.
Parliament Speaker Abeywardena said in a letter to Rajapaksa that a number of decisions had been made at the party leaders’ meeting, including the resignation of the president and prime minister as soon as possible and the convening of parliament within seven days. to elect an interim president.
“Under the caretaker president, the current parliament can appoint a new prime minister and caretaker government,” says the letter released by the Speaker’s office.
“Then, at a certain time, an election can be held for the people to elect a new parliament,” he added.
Leaders of several opposition parties also called for Rajapaksa’s resignation.
“The president and the prime minister must resign immediately. If that doesn’t happen, political instability will get worse,” Sri Lanka Freedom Party leader and former president Maithripala Sirisena said, speaking before Wickremesinghe offered to resign for him and before news that the president planned to step down.
“This is a risky situation. If a clear transition does not take place, the resignation of the president and prime minister will create a potentially dangerous power vacuum. The Speaker can appoint a new government from all parties, but it remains to be seen if it will be accepted by the protesters,” said political analyst Kusal Perera.
The political instability could undermine Sri Lanka’s talks with the International Monetary Fund as it seeks a $3bn bailout, restructuring of some foreign debt and fundraising from multilateral and bilateral sources to ease drought. Dollars.
The economic crisis developed after the COVID-19 pandemic hit the tourism-dependent economy and reduced remittances from overseas workers.
It has been aggravated by the build-up of heavy public debt, rising oil prices and a ban on importing chemical fertilizers last year that devastated agriculture. The fertilizer ban was lifted in November.
However, many blame the country’s decline on Rajapaksa’s economic mismanagement and there have been months of largely peaceful protests demanding his resignation.
Before storming government buildings on Saturday, protesters dismantled several police barricades in the government district of Colombo.
Police fired into the air but were unable to stop the crowd from surrounding the presidential residence, a witness said.
Discontent has risen in recent weeks as the cash-strapped country stopped receiving fuel shipments, forcing school closures and the rationing of gasoline and diesel for essential services.
(Reporting by Uditha Jayasinghe, Devjyot Ghoshal; Editing by Alex Richardson and Frances Kerry)