On October 12, 2016, a year after Maithripala Sirisena became president, he dropped a bomb at the Sri Lanka Foundation institution. He expressed his displeasure having former Defense Secretary Gotabhaya and former Navy Commander Wasantha Karnagoda and other military leaders were produce to the court cage and said that even though he had kept his mouth shut before, he had to speak out against such actions of the good governance government and indirectly indicated that his and Ranil’s good governance government is about to explode.
What was crushed by this Maithri’s sound of bomb explosion were the Prime Minister Ranil and the U.N.P. Ranil immediately summoned U.N.P. Ministers and discussed about this. Ranil was of the opinion that Maithrie made this speech out of anger due to an intelligence report given by the then Chief of Army Intelligence Suresh Saleh based on taking Gotabhaya and army leaders who were disappointed for taking them to courts and that it could develop into an anti-government movement within the army. Ranil and the Cabinet of Ministers were of the opinion that the pro-Gota military intelligence chief was conspiring to set Maithrie and Ranil against each other and plotting to overthrow the government, and it was decided by Ranils ministers to launch a campaign to remove them immediately. In the cabinet press conference held after that, the then health minister Rajitha Senaratne mentioned the name of Saleh, as the head of intelligence and criticised him.
‘Today, this military intelligence chief is destabilizing Jaffna. The Ava group that killed people in Jaffna was a creation of military intelligence.’ This is the story told by Rajitha. After that, the civil organization leader Professor Sarath Wijesuriya said that by creating problems between the President and the Prime Minister, it is the Chief of Military Intelligence officer Saleh, who is destabilizing the government, and he should be removed from office immediately. When leaders of civil organizations including this professor met with Maithrie and presented accusations against Saleh, Maithrie removed him from the post of head of military intelligence.
Ranil and UNP who said to remove the military intelligence chief is today the President and Defense Minister Ranil’s head of state intelligence. He was appointed as the Chief of State Intelligence after Gotabaya became President. Ranil, who succeeded Gota as president, did not remove him.
Now the opposition is calling for him to be removed because of the accusations against him in the Channel 4 Easter attack programme. But Ranil has not yet responded to it.
This Saleh incident shows that both Maithri and Ranil are two sides of the same coin. Maithri became the president on U.N.P. votes. Ranil became president with the votes of Podujana Peramuna MPs. Maithrie became president by U.N.P. votes and attacked UNP. Ranil had had to bow down to get a ministry to a U.N.P. member of parliament. Today, Ranil has become president through the votes of the Podujana Peramuna, but no matter how much the Rajapaksas bow before Ranil, he will not give ministers to the members of the Podujana Peramuna.
Maithri, created conflicts with UNP and Ranil and destabilized the whole country and led to destruction. Today, Ranil is creating conflicts with the leaders of Podujana Peramuna and creating problems that do not exist in the country.
After Maithri became the President, he did not want to say that he became the President because of U.N.P votes. He said that he got a lot of SLIP votes. Also, from the day he became president, he expected the common candidacy of U.N.P. for the next presidential election.
Ranil became the President of the Parliament by the votes of the members of the Podujana Peramuna, but Ranil did not accept it publicly. He says that he got the votes of Samagi Jana Balawegya and Tamil National Alliance. Also, since the day he became president, he has been trying to get the presidential candidacy of Podujana Peramuna.
Realizing that he would not get the support of the U.N.P. in the presidential election, Maitri conspired to split the U.N.P. Knowing that he will not get the Podujana Peramuna candidacy in the presidential election, Ranil is conspiring to split the Podujana Peramuna.
While conspiring to split the U.N.P, Maithri played every possible trick to break the opposition, Mahinda’s joint opposition. Today, while Ranil is trying to break the Podujana Peramuna, he is playing every possible trick he knows how to break the opposition Samagi Jana Balavegaya.
Maitri brought the bond charge against Ranil to destroy Ranil. Ranil tried to blame Maithri for the Easter attack to destroy Maithri. In the end both Maithri and Ranil were destroyed by the bond charge. Both Maithri and Ranil were destroyed in the Easter bomb. Maithripala appointed Arjun Mahendran, who was responsible for the bond scandal, as the Governor of the Central Bank. People did not accept Maithri’s story that ‘I appointed Arjun Mahendran because Ranil said so’. The people did not accept Ranil’s story that he could not prevent the Easter attack because he was not brought to the Security Council meetings.
When Gotabhaya was to appoint Ranil the prime minister when Mahinda stepped down, Nimal Siripala was sent with a message Maithripala to see he is ok for it. He agreed. Maithripala, who did not want Nimal Siripala or Dallas to become Prime Minister, did not express any opposition to Ranil becoming Prime Minister. But when Ranil became the president, Maithri was afraid that Ranil would take revenge on him. When the court gave its verdict regarding the Easter attack, Maithri was even more afraid that Ranil would sacrifice him for the Easter attack. Similarly Ranil was afraid of Maithri that Maithri would arrest him for the bond charges during their government . Now Maithri’s fear has increased and Maithri is looking to join Ranil. Dayasiri is the obstacle to that. That is why Maithrie sack Dayasiri from the party. The SLFP ministers in Ranil’s government gave Maithri the backing to oust Dayasiri as party secretary.
A new alliance is being created when Ranil, who was accused in the case of not trying to prevent the Easter bomb when the court pointed the finger at Maithripala for not trying to prevent the Easter bomb when Channel 4 pointed the finger at Gotabha, used presidential immunity. That alliance is the Ranil-Maithripala-Gotabhaya alliance. Even now, Gota and Ranil are in the same team. Now Maithri is in talks to remove from SLFP and join to this alliance.
Gotabaya became the candidate in the 2019 presidential election because of the Easter bomb. If the Easter bomb had not exploded, he would not have been the candidate. Gotabaya won the presidential election because of the Easter bomb. After the 2019 presidential election, Maithripala became politically unpopular and Ranil lost his election deposit in the 2020 general election because of the Easter bomb.
In 2022 Gotabaya fearing death run away giving the Presidency to Ranil. It is not for nothing that the Easter bomb comes to the fore over and over again. When the court ordered Maithripala to take responsibility for not being able to prevent the Easter attack and pay compensation, the helicopter alliance cornered Maithripala because they did not want to take Maithripala’s side.
Maithripala, who could not prevent the bomb, has received political punishment. Ranil, who was accused of failing to prevent the bomb in the 2020 general election, was also punished in the 2020 general election. Gotabha, who turned the Easter bomb into a political game, received the worst punishment in 2022. But they haven’t learned their lesson. Ranil became president with Gota’s help. Gota is protected by Ranil’s help. Maithri, who supported Gota in 2019 and survived the Easter bomb allegations, now allied with Ranil to avoid the Easter bomb allegations.
‘Will this alliance win…?’
It is still too early to make predictions about it