Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe today said that he does not want to form a United National Party (UNP) government at the next General Election and that he desires for the entire Parliament to be a government.
“What we have done is to work together with all the parties. In a way this is a challenge. In a way it’s an opportunity,” the UNP leader said, addressing an event at Royal College, Colombo.
“Because my hope is that after the next election, people ask me ‘are you going to form a UNP government? Are you going to form a UNP-SLFP government? Are you going to form an anti-Mahinda government?’ And my answer to all that is, no. I want the whole parliament to be a government,” he said.
Wickramasinghe said he believes that all the political parties in the country have a duty by the people and that they are also responsible for the present political system, which allowed for various wrongdoings and malpractices.
“We made it a form of tribal warfare. And if we didn’t make the change, the tribal warfare would have devolved us,” he said.
He stated that the country’s people lost a lot during the war and lost another 5 years after it. “Now the time has come to make up for what we lost, to ensure that in the next five years we put the country right.”
He stated that in order to provide Sri Lanka’s younger generation with a chance to build a life anew, the mindset of the people has to change.
“We have to think: can we for 5 years being in difference parties put the country first, work something out and at the end of the 5 years go back and contest and let the one who has the majority form the government and other go in the opposition?” he stressed.
The Parliament is expected to be dissolved on April 23 and a general election be held as promised in the 100 Days’ Program of the new government led by President Maithripala Sirisena.
In the run-up to the Presidential Election and after, the UNP leader had stated that the next general election will pave the way for a national government, comprising members of both the main political parties, the United National Party and Sri Lanka Freedom Party.
