By Chamodi Gunawardana

Several Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) members yesterday said that they would submit a no-confidence motion against Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on 9 June.

Addressing a news conference yesterday, SLFP Parliamentarian Mahindananda Aluthgamage stated that they would hand it over to Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa and try to 

convince him to push the issue through for a debate in Parliament on the same day. 

“We want to remove the Prime Minister and the minority Government to pave the way to form a United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) Government. This no-confidence motion is part of this mission and 85 Parliamentarians have already signed it,” Aluthgamage expressed.

Aluthgamage said that Wickremesinghe was only using his powers to arrest former ministers and officers over false allegations. 

“Wickremesinghe deceived the general public by giving them empty promises and false concessions. However, he is fully enjoying the benefits of the Premiership. Nevertheless, Wickremesinghe is scared to conduct an election because he knows that he will be defeated,” Aluthgamage explained.

Commenting on the 20th Amendment, Aluthgamage asserted that the forthcoming election should be conducted under a new electoral system. “We are ready to give our support to the 20th Amendment. The Government should listen to our requests and pass the 20th Amendment as soon as possible,” Aluthgamage said.

Western Province Chief Minister Prasanna Ranatunga, speaking at the same news conference, alleged that the Government was only concerned with Northern Province Chief Minister C.V Wigneswaran’s requests. 

“The Government has already fulfilled a number of demands made by Wigneswaran. He has even requested the Government to remove army personnel from the North. However, we believe that the Government is directly responsible for the riots that occurred in Jaffna recently,” Ranatunga alleged. 

Ranatunga also mentioned that the Government had failed to keep the country clean and the public had complained about this situation to the authorities. He also blamed the Government for dissolving Local Government bodies and pointed out that garbage had become an issue today as a result of the Government dissolving Local Government bodies. 

Ranatunga added that the SLFP was planning to increase the numbers of its supporters to 7,000,000 and it was expecting to contest the forthcoming election as an alliance.