Sri Lanka’s prime minister agreed to resign on Saturday on the day protesters stormed the president’s residence and office in a fury over a worsening economic crisis
and nearby office to vent their anger against a leader they hold responsible for the nation’s worst crisis.
Rajapaksa appointed Wickremesinghe as prime minister in May in the hope that the career politician would use his diplomacy and contacts to resuscitate a collapsed economy. But people’s patience wore thin as shortages of fuel, medicine and cooking gas only increased and oil reserves ran dry. Leaders of political parties in Parliament met later and decided to request Rajapaksa and Wickremesinghe to step down, opposition lawmaker Rauff Hakeem said on Twitter. He said a consensus was reached that the parliamentary speaker should take over as temporary president and work on an interim government.
At the president’s office, security personnel tried to stop demonstrators who pushed through fences to run across the lawns and inside the colonial-era building. Protest and religious leaders called on Rajapaksa to step down, saying he has lost the people’s mandate.
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