Sri Lanka crisis: President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to resign, PM confirms

Colombo, July 11: Amid mounting pressure from protesters, embattled Sri Lanka President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has officially informed Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe that he is stepping down from his post.

The President has told the PM that he will be resigning as previously announced, the Prime Minister's media unit said, according to Colombo Gazette. On Saturday, Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena announced that the President will resign from his post on July 13.

It comes two days after thousands of people stormed into the President's House in Fort on Saturday. From taking a dip in the swimming pool to preparing food, several videos showed that the protesters had a gala time at his palace. Even the Prime Minister's private house has also been forcefully occupied by protestors.

People who have stormed into the residences of the President and Prime Minister have cleared that they will continue to occupy their houses until they resign from their posts.

Sri Lanka is suffering its worst economic crisis since gaining independence in 1948, which comes on the heels of successive waves of COVID-19, threatening to undo years of development progress and severely undermining the country's ability to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The oil supply shortage has forced schools and government offices to close until further notice. Reduced domestic agricultural production, a lack of foreign exchange reserves, and local currency depreciation have fuelled the shortages. The economic crisis will push families into hunger and poverty - some for the first time - adding to the half a million people who the World Bank estimates have fallen below the poverty line because of the pandemic.