The protests surrounding Rajapaksa’s home followed weeks of building unrest due to massive shortages of fuel and essential food items and multi-hour power cuts: everyday manifestations of Sri Lanka’s worst economic crisis in decades. Sri Lanka’s enormous debt load and depletion of foreign reserves, exacerbated by a faltering tourism industry due to the COVID-19 pandemic, have highlighted economic mismanagement by Rajapaksa’s government. By the third day of protests, the entire Sri Lankan Cabinet had resigned.
torsdag 14. april 2022
Sri Lanka’s Oppressive Stability Starts to Crumble
On the evening of April 2, Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa declared a weekend-long state of emergency on the island after protests erupted outside his Colombo residence. While Sri Lanka is no stranger to periods of state of emergency – the last was imposed as recently as 2018 due to anti-Muslim riots – this time was different.
The protests surrounding Rajapaksa’s home followed weeks of building unrest due to massive shortages of fuel and essential food items and multi-hour power cuts: everyday manifestations of Sri Lanka’s worst economic crisis in decades. Sri Lanka’s enormous debt load and depletion of foreign reserves, exacerbated by a faltering tourism industry due to the COVID-19 pandemic, have highlighted economic mismanagement by Rajapaksa’s government. By the third day of protests, the entire Sri Lankan Cabinet had resigned.
The protests surrounding Rajapaksa’s home followed weeks of building unrest due to massive shortages of fuel and essential food items and multi-hour power cuts: everyday manifestations of Sri Lanka’s worst economic crisis in decades. Sri Lanka’s enormous debt load and depletion of foreign reserves, exacerbated by a faltering tourism industry due to the COVID-19 pandemic, have highlighted economic mismanagement by Rajapaksa’s government. By the third day of protests, the entire Sri Lankan Cabinet had resigned.
