Sri Lanka’s president was due to appoint a new government on Monday as security forces braced for possible violence with further protests over worsening food, fuel and medicine shortages.
• Read also: Protests in Sri Lanka: the army on the streets, social networks blocked
• Read also: Sri Lanka deploys military to quell protests
Twenty-six ministers except President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his elder brother Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa submitted their resignation letters in a meeting held late Sunday night.
This block resignation paves the way for the appointment of a new government by the president on Monday, which could include some of the resigning ministers.
The country of 22 million inhabitants suffers from shortages of essential goods, food products, fuel, medicines, power cuts and record inflation, with nothing to suggest an end to the economic difficulties.
The government, which acknowledged it was the worst economic crisis since independence from Britain in 1948, asked for help from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but negotiations could last until the end of the year.
The military and police were placed on high alert as a 36-hour curfew ended at dawn on Monday, despite intelligence reports warning of new unrest, a senior security official told AFP.
New events
“According to our indications, we can expect further demonstrations,” he said, reaffirming that the army had been empowered to detain suspects under the state of emergency declared on Friday.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa had imposed a state of emergency on Friday, the day after an attempted assault on his residence in Colombo by an angry mob.
Throughout the evening of Sunday, hundreds of people demonstrated, while remaining peaceful, in several towns on the island to denounce the management of the crisis by President Rajapaksa.
“Go away Gota, go away Gota,” protesters shouted in Rajagiriya, near the parliament, while in Negombo, near the main international airport, the crowd chanted “Gota failed, failed, failed.”
Sunday’s all-day curfew prevented the organization of larger protests thanks to the blocking of social networks Twitter, Facebook, Whatsapp, YouTube and Instagram denounced by the main opposition alliance, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB).
Social media censorship was lifted later in the day after the Human Rights Commission ruled it illegal.
Activists have warned that larger protests will take place in several key cities on Monday to call for the resignation of President Rajapaksa and his clan.
Poor policy decisions have compounded the problems, economists say. Misguided tax cuts just before the pandemic starved the state of revenue and deepened the debt.