Sri Lanka: Rajapaksa foreign policy from anti-West to anti-India

The issue of services sector needs to be carefully negotiated to ensure no loss to Sri Lankan professionals while opening up the giant Indian service sector to strong Sri Lankan businesses, especially for our larger listed companies, should have concessionary access to India.

by Harim Peiris 

( March 30, 2016, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The Mahinda Rajapaksa administration especially in its post war, second term became fairly stridently anti West, especially in the run up to and during the presidential election of January 2015, which it comprehensively lost and thereby ending Rajapaksa rule in Sri Lanka. However despite being the first and only incumbent president to lose a re-election bid, Mahinda Rajapaksa has also become the only former president of the republic to choose not to retire from active politics and has desired to continue as a Member of Parliament, representing the Kurunegala District. He effectively functions as the political leader and the inspiration, of the minor party led joint opposition.

The foreign policy spokesman of the joint opposition is the former Foreign Minister, the learned professor from Panadura, (no kinsman I hasten to add), and whom despite not being in Parliament uses the opposition press conferences as his platform to articulate the views of the opposition and more particularly to be his master’s voice. (Pun intended).

Rajapaksa and allies have not learned from their twin defeats

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