Sri Lanka’s embattled president flew out of his country to the Maldives early on Wednesday (Jul 13), in a probable prelude to his resignation after months of widespread protests against his island nation’s worst economic crisis.
Gotabaya Rajapaksa had promised at the weekend to resign on Wednesday and clear the way for a “peaceful transition of power”, after fleeing his official residence in Colombo just before tens of thousands of protesters overran it.
As president, Rajapaksa enjoys immunity from arrest, and he is believed to have wanted to go abroad before stepping down to avoid the possibility of being detained.
He, his wife and a bodyguard were among four passengers on board an Antonov-32 military aircraft which took off from the main international airport heading for the neighbouring Maldives, according to immigration sources.
“Their passports were stamped and they boarded the special air force flight,” an immigration official involved in the process told AFP.
A government source and a person close to Rajapaksa said he was in Male, the capital of the Maldives. The president would most likely proceed to another Asian country from there, the government source said.
The president has not been seen in public since Friday.
Sources close to Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, the speaker of Sri Lanka’s parliament, said he was yet to receive any communication from Rajapaksa. The source close to Rajapaksa said he would send in a letter of resignation later on Wednesday.
The departure of the 73-year-old leader once known as “The Terminator” had been stymied for more than 24 hours in a stand-off with immigration personnel at the airport.
He had wanted to fly to Dubai on a commercial flight, but staff at Bandaranaike International withdrew from VIP services and insisted that all passengers had to go through public counters.
The presidential party were reluctant to go through regular channels fearing public reactions, a security official said, and as a result, missed four flights on Monday that could have taken them to the United Arab Emirates.
Clearance for a military flight to land in the closest neighbour India was not immediately secured, a security official said, and at one point on Tuesday the group headed to a naval base with a view of fleeing by sea.
Rajapaksa’s youngest brother Basil, who resigned in April as finance minister, missed his own Emirates flight to Dubai early Tuesday after a tense standoff of his own with the airport staff.
Basil – who holds US citizenship in addition to Sri Lankan nationality – tried to use a paid concierge service for business travellers, but airport and immigration staff said they had withdrawn from the fast track service.
“There were some other passengers who protested against Basil boarding their flight,” an airport official told AFP. “It was a tense situation, so he hurriedly left the airport.”
UNITY GOVERNMENT
Basil had to obtain a new US passport after leaving his behind at the presidential palace when the Rajapaksas beat a hasty retreat to avoid mobs on Saturday, a diplomatic source said.
Official sources said a suitcase full of documents had also been left behind at the stately mansion along with 17.85 million rupees (about US$50,000) in cash, now in the custody of a Colombo court.
There was no official word from the president’s office about his whereabouts, but he remained commander-in-chief of the armed forces with military resources at his disposal. CNA
