President offers to share power as protests mount

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s president offered to share power with the opposition on Monday as protests escalated across the country demanding his resignation over worsening shortages of food, fuel and medicines, AFP reported.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s appeal to legislators came as heavily armed security forces looked to quell more demonstrations.

“The president invites all political parties in parliament to accept Cabinet posts and join the effort to seek solutions to the national crisis,” Rajapaksa’s office said in a statement.

It stressed that solutions to the deepening crisis should be found “within a democratic framework”, as hundreds were joining spontaneous demonstrations in cities, towns and villages.

Troops and police were placed on high alert as a 36-hour curfew ended at dawn on Monday despite intelligence reports warning of more unrest, a top security official told AFP.

Throughout Sunday evening, hundreds of people had staged noisy but peaceful demonstrations in towns across the island of 22 million, denouncing Rajapaksa’s handling of the crisis.

Sunday’s full-day curfew prevented larger protests that had been organized through social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp, all of which were blocked by the government.

The platforms were unlocked and the partial internet censorship ended after 15 hours, as the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka ruled the ban was illegal.

Activists said they would hold larger demonstrations in several key towns on Monday to force the once hugely-popular Rajapaksa and his family to step down.

Many economists say Sri Lanka’s crisis has been exacerbated by government mismanagement, years of accumulated borrowing and ill-advised tax cuts.