Opposition leader faces threat from partymen

Mahinda Rajapaksha, the opposition leader in Parliament, who has been facing a leadership crisis over the past few months, is now facing a fresh threat from the back benchers of his party.

Thirty-four backbenchers of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) in Parliament have moved a resolution that President Chandrika Kumaratunga should preside over future meetings of their party's Parliamentarians, instead of Rajapaksha.

The call has come from the 'Mulberry group' within the party which claims that Rajapaksha was favouring only his loyalists in the party and was not even giving the others members a chance to talk at the group meetings.

These developments come in the wake of one of the group meetings presided over by the opposition leader last Thursday ending with some of the members exchanging fisticuffs.

A section of the members who attended the meeting, believed to be loyalists of Rajpaksha, had accused one of the members of 'carrying tales' to Kumaratunga who has been favouring her brother Anura Bandaranaike to succeed her as the next presidential candidate.

Rajapaksha, hailing from the southern province and being one of the longstanding members of the SLFP, the main constituent party of the People's Alliance (PA) coalition, was compelled to demand the post of the opposition leader in Parliament early this year.

Some of the senior members in the party were supporting former Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickre-menayake as the opposition leader, a move which would keep the post on hold until Bandara-naike took up the position.

But Rajapaksha put up a strong campaign for the post and eventually was named as opposition leader. Since then Bandaranaike has been claiming that he would be the next presidential candidate for the PA at the elections which are due to take place in three-and-a half-years.

Rajapaksha has been saying that it was 'too early' to decide on the next presidential candidate, but hinted that he should be the next candidate.

Recently, the opposition leader made a public appeal to journalists not to raise the issue about the PA's next presidential candidate until the right time arrives on deciding who the next candidate should be. Bandaranaike is being strongly supported by former Media Minister Mangala Samaraweera.