ACMC top members say NCM against Bathiudeen will be defeated

• Congress defends the Minister, says Opposition parties using him to further political agendas 

The top rung of the All Ceylon Makkal Congress (ACMC) that is led by Industry and Commerce Minister Rishad Bathiudeen has pledged to defeat the no confidence motion against their leader. 

They also denied that the arrested Dr. Seigu Saafi who was employed at the Kurunegala Hospital was a member of the ACMC. The members insisted he had been removed from the party membership earlier and charged that the link was being used by Opposition politicians to discredit Bathiudeen.  “Dr. Shafi is not a member of the ACMC. The ACMC has only five MPs in Parliament. Dr. Shafi left our party earlier,” said ACMC Lawyer Rushdy Habib, addressing reporters on Thursday.

“ACMC has only five MPs in Parliament. Dr. Shafi left our party after we too let him go. He received a high numbers of votes in Kurunegala but since the ACMC list had only five MPs for Parliament and he was the sixth, he was removed from ACMC membership and fixed to the UNP list. Therefore we have no associations with him now,” said Habib. 

“With regard to the arrest of former Provincial Council MP Rifkan Bathiudeen, the issue has been raised whether he, after being arrested, having obtained a statement, was then released without being produced in Court. During a round-up operation he too was questioned just as any other individual coming under their search. He was questioned about his vehicle as well. But he was not arrested since there was nothing suspicious with him or about the vehicle. Rifkan was only questioned during the search since in any roundup, everyone is questioned – even if they round up a judicial official, he too will be questioned, that is the routine of a roundup. But some media reported that Rifkan was ‘arrested and then released,’ which was false and wrong.” 

Former ACMC MP (PC) P. Jayathilleke addressing reporters said two villages in Welioya in the Northern Province were under LTTE control from 1983 right up to 2009. The Chief Buddhist monks of the two temples in these villages had given details about Bathiudeen’s support to their temples. The ACMC members pointed out that the Buddhist temples were constructed with the help of Bathiudeen. 

“The allegations made against Minister Bathiudeen in the NCM are baseless. To date no person has filed a complaint with the Police or gone to Court against Minister Bathiudeen on the basis of any one of these 10 accusations in the NCM, which proves the NCM accusations themselves are baseless, and politically motivated. They are exacting political revenge since Minister Bathiudeen did not extend his support to them during the 52-day coup in 2018. Even we insist that if Minister Bathiudeen is guilty on any of these allegations, he should be punished. But we are against making mere allegations against Minister Bathiudeen just for political gains and on an ‘anti-ACMC agenda’,” Jayathilleke said.  

The ACMC members also vowed that the Parliamentary NCM against Bathiudeen would be defeated.