COLOMBO: Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was willing to resign to make way for a new unity government, his office said Saturday, after President Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled his official residence when it was mobbed by protesters.
“So as to ensure safety of the citizens, he is agreeable to this recommendation by opposition party leaders” to quit, Wickremesinghe’s office said.
Earlier, a mob stormed into Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s home in Colombo on Saturday evening and set it ablaze, police and his office said.
“Protesters have broken into the private residence of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and have set it on fire,” his office said in a statement.
Sri Lankan protesters set the prime minister’s private home on fire, hours after chasing the president from his residence, as months of frustration over an unprecedented economic crisis boiled over on Saturday.
Hundreds of thousands of people massed in the capital Colombo through the morning to demand the government take responsibility for mismanaging the nation’s finances, and for months of crippling food and fuel shortages.
After storming the gates of the presidential palace, hundreds of people could be seen in live broadcasts on social media walking through its rooms, with some among the boisterous crowd jumping into the compound’s pool.
Others were seen laughing and lounging in the stately bedrooms of the residence, with one pulling out what he claimed was a pair of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s underwear.
Shortly beforehand, troops guarding the residence fired in the air to hold the crowd back until Rajapaksa was safely removed.
“The president was escorted to safety,” a top defence source told AFP on condition of anonymity. “He is still the president, he is being protected by the navy.”
He said the president had boarded a naval craft at the Colombo port, which later moved to the southern waters of the island.
The colonial-era mansion he left is one of Sri Lanka’s key symbols of state power, and officials said Rajapaksa’s departure raised questions as to whether he intended to remain in office.
Soon after the crowd stormed the presidential palace, Rajapaksa’s nearby seafront office also fell into the hands of protesters.
Security forces attempted to disperse the huge crowds that had mobbed Colombo’s administrative district.
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, the first person in line to succeed Rajapaksa, called a meeting with political leaders and said he was willing to step down to pave the way for a unity government.
But that failed to placate protesters, who stormed the premier’s private residence and set it alight after night fell.
Footage shared on social media showed a crowd cheering the blaze, which broke out shortly after a security detachment guarding Wickremesinghe attacked several journalists outside the home.
No casualties have been reported in the fire so far, and police said Wickremesinghe and his family were away at the time.
Earlier, a spokeswoman for Colombo’s main hospital said three people were being treated for gunshot wounds, along with 36 others suffering breathing difficulties after being caught up in tear gas barrages.
