‘NPP may reach out to other MPs to form govt’

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s leftist National People’s Power (NPP) may have to reach out to individual MPs of other parties if the NPP is victorious in a parliamentary election but cannot secure 113 seats, party leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake said.

Speaking to a group of Sri Lankan expats living in the US, Dissanayake said if the election result indicates that the voters have attempted to form an NPP government as opposed to relegating it to its traditional role of “watcher” or security guard of parliament, the party would be obligated to honor that verdict.

“If the voters have attempted to give us power and not to relegate us to the role of a watcher, but we were somehow unable to get 113 seats, we think we may have to go into an agreement, not with the other parties, but with some elected MPs,” said Dissanayake.

“If the people wish to form a government, we have no right to disregard that. They tried to give us a government but could not give us 113. To fulfill that, we have to devise a strategy,” he said.

The NPP leader, who also leads the Marxist-Leninist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), the party that effectively controls the NPP “collective,” said, however, that there is little chance of an election before the presidential election that’s due in October 2024.

According to Dissanayake, it is not in President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s interest to call a parliamentary election before the presidential election, as doing so would negatively impact the latter’s chances at a presidential poll.

He said that even a local government election would reflect voter sentiment that would prove a challenge.