COLOMBO (BBC): Sri Lanka’s beleaguered president will not be resigning, his government’s whip has told parliament. The declaration defies calls from the public and political opponents for Gotabaya Rajapaksa to step down amid the country’s economic crisis. Crowds have protested for weeks over lengthy power cuts and shortages of gas, food and other basic goods.
The public anger has prompted nearly all Cabinet ministers to quit, and scores of MPs to leave his government. Opposition MPs have also rejected his invite to form a national unity government, saying voters want the president and entire government to resign. But on Wednesday, Chief Government Whip Johnston Fernando told lawmakers: “As a responsible Government, we state President Gotabaya Rajapaksa will not resign from his post under any circumstances.”
Mr Rajapaksa lifted controversial state of emergency measures following further protests, the departure of several government lawmakers and the resignation of his finance minister. The president had invoked the law – which allows the arrest of suspects without warrants – on 1 April after protests outside his house. But he lifted them in an apparent concession to angry citizens. Earlier that day in parliament, 41 MPs had left the president’s ruling coalition to “represent themselves independently”. The implication of this is still unclear. Sri Lanka is facing its worst economic crisis since gaining independence from the UK in 1948.
The heavily import-reliant South Asian nation no longer has enough dollar reserves to buy essential items like food, fuel to power vehicles or even generate electricity. People have been suffering power cuts of up to 13 hours, massive inflation and a shortage of food and basic goods. Protests across the country continued on Wednesday. Public frustration over the crisis has seen peaceful demonstrations held since January.
But the situation has escalated in the last fortnight, with many more people taking to the streets as power cuts stretched to 13 hours and petrol stations ran out of fuel. “People can’t afford their daily rice, their dhal, their basic necessities. People can’t get on buses to come to work, to go to school,” one protester told the BBC this week. While most protests are peaceful, there have also been violent flare-ups – with attacks on politicians’ homes and clashes between protesters and police. The UN Human Rights Council expressed its concerns about the emergency measures in a statement issued before they were lifted.
The UN noted the reports of police violence and said it was worried the restrictions aimed at “preventing or discouraging people from legitimately expressing their grievances through public protests”. It added that: “The drift towards militarisation and the weakening of institutional checks and balances in Sri Lanka have affected the state’s ability to effectively tackle the economic crisis.”
Meanwhile, Fatima Hussein has been standing in a queue for eight hours in scorching heat to buy kerosene at a petrol station in a busy suburb of the Sri Lankan capital. A single mother of three children, Fatima says she has been queueing for kerosene at least twice a week for the past few months. On those days, she is unable to work.
“If I don’t work, I don’t get paid. I make around 1, 200 rupees a day and bear all expenses of the family. All my children are in school and their expenses are mounting,” she told Al Jazeera. Priced the cheapest among all fuels, at 87 rupees a litre (less than 30 US cents for 34 fluid ounces), kerosene is the preferred fuel of the urban poor, estate workers and fishermen in Sri Lanka. These communities use kerosene for cooking, lighting and, in the case of fishermen, to power their boats. “We use kerosene to cook and even for lamps to save money on electricity. Gas has always been a luxury we could not afford,” said Fatima.
On the days she needs to buy kerosene, Fatima said she arrives at the fuel station by 7am. “There is a long queue even at that time,” she said. “We wait in line under the hot sun. I bring a bottle of water. I can’t afford to buy food. We stand close to each other, tightly packed, and wait,” she said. “The government says people must maintain social distancing because of the threat of COVID-19. They don’t care about us because we are poor. People are angry and frustrated and they have blocked the roads several times demanding fuel.”
For months now, thousands of Sri Lankans have queued for fuel, cooking gas, food and medicine amid the country’s worst economic crisis since independence in 1948, triggering spontaneous protests on the streets across the island demanding the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. Shortly after thousands of people defied a state of emergency and curfew and joined street protests denouncing the government, the entire cabinet – except the president’s older brother, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa – resigned. In order to resolve the crisis, the president offered the opposition to join a unity government, but the main opposition party, the United People’s Force (SJB) has rejected the offer.
The Sri Lankan parliament met for the first time since the declaration of the state of emergency. Meanwhile, as fuel prices rise due to the Russia-Ukraine war, the island’s stocks are running out. The foreign exchange shortage has also hit essential supplies, including food and medicine. The price of petrol and diesel has almost doubled within a month. The price of LPG, commonly used for cooking by residents in urban areas, has tripled this year, forcing people to turn to kerosene.
H R Mohammed, 43, who has also been standing in a queue for kerosene for more than six hours, said he saw an elderly man collapse while waiting in the long line. “Given that Ramadan fasting is to commence in a few days, many more will be victims of heat and exhaustion,” he told Al Jazeera last week. The holy month of Ramadan, in which Muslims fast from dawn to dusk, started in Sri Lanka on April 2.
Mohammed, who drives an auto-rickshaw, says each day spent in kerosene queues adds to his financial troubles. S A Wijepala, 66, a resident of Kiribathgoda, says while he does not like the taste of food cooked with kerosene, this is all he could afford. A former employee of the Sri Lankan railways, he said his pension is barely enough to meet his basic needs amid high inflation.
“Late last year, we decided that we will have to switch to kerosene. This was even before gas prices went through the roof. Now a gas cylinder is over 4,000 rupees and this is beyond me. So, I am compelled to stay in line for hours and buy kerosene,” he said. Bank employee Niroshani Perera says she carries several canisters to work and stands in line whenever she hears that kerosene is available at a station. Niroshani said some government officials allege that most people in kerosene queues are hoarding it to sell it in the black market. “These allegations are not only hurtful but also make people very angry,” she said. “The ministers and officials should be more sensitive to our struggles.”
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