In his letter of resignation, the former Head of State highlights the damage caused by the Covid-19 pandemic on the national economy.
Article written by
Posted
Update
Reading time : 1 min.
This is a letter that was read in front of Parliament on Saturday July 16. In a brief letter of resignation sent from Singapore, where he fled, former Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa claims to have “the maximum” to prevent the economic catastrophe that is hitting his country and believes that the Covid-19 pandemic has reduced his efforts to nothing.
“It is a personal satisfaction for me to have been able to protect our people from the pandemic despite the economic crisis that we were already facing at the time”, says the former leader. On this island of 22 million inhabitants, the Covid-19 has killed more than 16,500 people. Gotabaya Rajapaksa had refused to establish containment during the first wave. “Do not panic”he had told the doctors.
His successor elected on Wednesday
In his letter, Gotabaya Rajapaksa assures that Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves were already low when he took office in November 2019. At the time, however, Sri Lanka had a comfortable reserve of 7.5 billion dollars, according to official figures. These reserves are no more than a billion dollars today and the country has been in suspension of payments since mid-April.
Sri Lankan MPs will meet on Wednesday to elect the successor to the resigning president, who fled to Singapore after protesters invaded his residence. Prime Minister and Acting President Ranil Wickremesinghe, 73, is the favourite. However, the latter is also the target of the demonstrators but he has the support of the ruling party, which has the largest number of seats in Parliament.