Anura Kumara Dissanayake sworn in as president, says he’s no magician

Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake throughout a gathering in Colombo, Sri Lanka on September 23, 2024 | Picture Credit score: PTI

Sri Lanka’s newly elected President Anura Kumara Dissanayake on Monday (23 September 2024) vowed to strengthen democracy and “work onerous to earn the belief of the individuals”, with the caveat that he’s not a “magician”.

“I’m not a magician, I’m not a miracle employee. There are issues I do know and issues I don’t know, however I’ll decide to doing the precise factor always and main a collective effort to rebuild our nation,” he stated in his first speech as president, simply after taking the oath of workplace on the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo, the constructing that protesters stormed in July 2022 to oust former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa amid a extreme monetary disaster.

Dissanayake, 55, takes over because the nation’s high official at a time when the island nation is struggling to emerge from a crippling financial disaster. Scores of poor households are looking for pressing aid from each day financial pressure amid hovering residing prices and skyrocketing utility payments as a part of an IMF-led program that launched painful austerity measures.

Mr Dissanayake gained 42.31% of the vote to win the presidential election on 21 September, by which he was carefully matched by opposition chief Sajith Premadasa and former president Ranil Wickremesinghe. His Nationwide Individuals’s Energy Alliance (NPP) campaigned on an anti-corruption theme and promised to alter the nation’s political tradition. Mr Dissanayake’s victory marks a shift in Sri Lankan politics away from the nation’s conventional events and political elite. He leads the NPP’s principal political group, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP or Individuals’s Liberation Entrance), a celebration with a Marxist-Leninist ideology.

Though Dissanayake emerged victorious within the nationwide election, he didn’t win a majority of votes among the many nation’s ethnic minority communities, particularly Tamils ​​within the north and east. In a message apparently directed at them and others who voted for his rivals, he stated: “Democracy helped me win. Some voted for me and a few didn’t. However my dedication is to work onerous to earn the belief of those that didn’t vote for me as effectively. This is a crucial a part of my presidency.” He additionally pledged help for enterprise and stated he would work with all worldwide gamers, retaining Sri Lanka’s finest pursuits in thoughts.

President Dissanayake on Monday (23 September 2024) appointed secretaries to a number of ministers. He’s anticipated to call a brand new cupboard on Tuesday (24 September 2024), Colombo-based political sources stated.