At the time of the struggle (socalled Aragalaya), several activists told a press conferences that one of the aims of the struggle was to end the politics of the Rajapaksas.
One of the activists associated with the Frontline Socialist Party a YouTube channel that the main objective of the struggle is to oust the Rajapaksas and that they are getting a massive support towards this end.
What the activist meant was that they are getting massive support mainly a large amount of money for conducting the protests.
It was a golden opportunity for LTTE sympathisers to take revenge from the Rajapaksas that provided political leadership to defeat LTTE terrorism, amid the global economic crisis that arose following the Covid-19 pandemic.
The operation against the Rajapaksas was carried out strategically according to the theory of the proverb “beat the iron when it is hot” as this kind of economic crisis will not arise again easily.
Targeting Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the slogan “Gota go home” came to the fore, but their hidden agenda was to remove Mahinda Rajapaksa, Basil Rajapaksa and Namal Rajapaksa from politics.
Knowing that Mahinda Rajapaksa is the core of the Rajapaksas, those planners wanted to remove Mahinda Rajapaksa from the post of Prime Minister. Thereafter, getting rid of Gotabaya Rajapaksa will be very easy. If Mahinda Rajapaksa had not been removed from the post of Prime Minister on May 9, 2022, Gotabaya Rajapaksa would still be the President of this country.
We should talk about that separately. But the plan to remove Mahinda Rajapaksa, Basil Rajapaksa and Namal Rajapaksa from politics was implemented long ago.
After Maithripala Sirisena assumed the presidency on January 8, 2015, under the good governance Government, the 19th Amendment to the Constitution was introduced to target the Rajapaksas, and it is no secret that this amendment attempted to influence Namal Rajapaksa’s political career as well.
It is not a secret that an age limit was imposed to qualify for the position of presidential candidate fearing that Namal Rajapaksa will contest the presidential election.
Also it is not a secret that the Financial Crimes Investigation Division (FCID) was established to hunt down the Rajapaksa’s.
Here, the FCID paid the most attention to Namal Rajapaksa. Namal was arrested and the FCID went to great lengths to file several cases against him.
The then head of the FCID, Ravi Vaidiyalankara, stated in several newspapers that FCID operations were influenced with strong political pressure.
Suhada Gamlath, a Deputy Solicitor General at that time, also said that there was a lot of political pressure on the Attorney General’s Department with cases targeting individuals.
During the hearing of the court cases against Namal Rajapaksa, there were reports in the media that the testimonies of some witnesses were contradictory.
No one said Namal go home, but Namal Rajapaksa had to quit the post of Minister of Sports and Youth Affairs for no fault of his own.
Namal decided to resign from the ministerial position he had in his youth solving many difficulties of cricket and other sports were facing.With this act Namal demonstrated that he can withstand any political situation.
It is not possible to predict yet whether some political opponents are attempting to terminate the political career of Namal as they planned to oust certain Rajapaksas. But that decision is in the hands of Namal Rajapaksa.
Ruwan Perera