NEW DELHI: He was trying to be a round peg in a square hole but his regimented and military approach to governance could not save Sri Lanka. The very people who elected Gotabaya Rajapaksa President of this beautiful island nation with great enthusiasm and popular support in November 2019, eventually turned against him on Saturday, July 9. Months of discontent and frustration brought about by the collapse of the country’s economy erupted in an amorphous mob fury forcing Gotabaya to announce he would resign as President on July 14, two years and a half before his term was to end.
Ranil Wickremesinghe, who was appointed Prime Minister by Gotabaya less than two months ago, has already resigned. An interim President and an all-party government will likely be in place this week to try and administer the country that has defaulted on its sovereign debt and is desperately waiting for a bailout package from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Elections may have to be held to elect a new President and a new Parliament as soon as possible. It is, however, not clear how the interim government will find a way out of the economic mess. Sri Lanka has no foreign currency in its kitty; food items, fuel and medicines continue to be in short supply....Read More
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Author, thought leader and one of South Asia's leading strategic analysts, Nitin A. Gokhale has forty years of rich and varied experience behind him as a conflict reporter, Editor, author and now a media entrepreneur who owns and curates two important digital platforms, BharatShakti.in and StratNewsGlobal.com focusing on national security, strategic affairs and foreign policy matters.
At the beginning of his long and distinguished career, Gokhale has lived and reported from India’s North-east for 23 years, writing and analysing various insurgencies in the region, been on the ground at Kargil in the summer of 1999 during the India-Pakistan war, and also brought live reports from Sri Lanka’s Eelam War IV between 2006-2009.
Author of over a dozen books on wars, insurgencies and conflicts, Gokhale relocated to Delhi in 2006, was Security and Strategic Affairs Editor at NDTV, a leading Indian broadcaster for nine years, before launching in 2015 his own digital properties.
An alumni of the Asia-Pacific Centre for Security Studies in Hawaii, Gokhale now writes, lectures and analyses security and strategic matters in Indo-Pacific and travels regularly to US, Europe, South and South-East Asia to speak at various international seminars and conferences.
Gokhale also teaches at India’s Defence Services Staff College (DSSC), the three war colleges, India's National Defence College, College of Defence Management and the intelligence schools of both the R&AW and Intelligence Bureau.
He tweets at @nitingokhale
Thanks for another insight about Sri Lanka and thank u for the same. Looking forward to India’s fishermen’s pathetic state suffering done by Sri Lankan forces and related enlightenment. Looking forward to your programme this evening Till then best wishes again for good times
R.s.vijayan.
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1 Comment
Thanks for another insight about Sri Lanka and thank u for the same. Looking forward to India’s fishermen’s pathetic state suffering done by Sri Lankan forces and related enlightenment. Looking forward to your programme this evening Till then best wishes again for good times
R.s.vijayan.
****
*”