Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa emailed his resignation to the Speaker of Parliament shortly after landing in Singapore, a spokesman for the parliamentary official, Indunil Yapa, said on Thursday. After review by the country’s Attorney General, it was formally accepted, according to the same source.
For three months, the South Asian island of 22 million people, rocked by violence, has suffered shortages of gasoline, electricity and record inflation, with protesters accusing leaders of bankrupting the country .
Mr Rajapaksa arrived in the city-state earlier in the day with his wife Ioma and two bodyguards on board a commercial flight. According to the local press, he had first demanded a private jet to go to Singapore, because of the hostile reception he received when he arrived in the Maldives on Wednesday.
A few hours before, the Sri Lankan demonstrators had withdrawn from public buildings occupied in recent days, while promising to continue to put pressure on the president and the prime minister, whose resignation they demanded.
Witnesses saw dozens of people leaving the prime minister’s office on Thursday as armed security forces entered. Armored personnel carriers patrolled parts of the capital under curfew.
The protesting crowd invaded the offices of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on Wednesday, after having done the same on Saturday with the palace of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, forcing him to flee abroad.
Tensions in parliament and the presidential palace
Hours before the withdrawal was announced, police pushed back protesters trying to enter parliament.
Nearly 85 people were injured in the clashes and one man died of tear gas suffocation.
Hundreds of thousands of people have visited the presidential palace since it opened to the public after Mr Rajapaksa fled on Saturday.
Thursday afternoon, the doors of the building were closed and guarded by armed men.
Earlier in the day, Gihan Martyn, a 49-year-old trader accused the president of “playing the clock”.
“He’s a coward,” he growled outside the presidential palace, “he ruined our country with the Rajapaksa family, so we don’t trust him at all. We need a new government”.
The army and police received new orders on Thursday to firmly suppress any violence, and warned troublemakers that they were “legitimately entitled to exercise force”.
Not enough to scare Chirath Chathuranga Jayalath, 26-year-old student: “You cannot stop these demonstrations by killing people. They will shoot us in the head, but we do this with our hearts.
Not its final destination
Singapore will not be his final destination. The city-state said Mr Rajapaksa was on a private visit.
“He did not ask for asylum and no asylum was granted to him. Singapore does not generally accept asylum applications,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.
The United States has reportedly denied Gotabaya Rajapaksa a visa application because he renounced his US citizenship in 2019 before running for president, diplomatic sources say.
According to sources close to Sri Lankan security, Mr Rajapaksa is looking to stay in Singapore for some time before heading to the United Arab Emirates.