Opposition defections strengthens Sri Lanka president's hand+

Associated Press, Sun January 28, 2007 03:49 EST . - - COLOMBO, Jan. 28 (Kyodo) Sri Lanka - President Mahinda Rajapakse strengthened his hand in the legislature Sunday by inducting 20 opposition lawmakers into his administration, a spokesman at his office said. Two members from the Sri Lanka - Muslim Congress also joined the government. Party leader Rauff Hakeem was offered a Cabinet ministerial post.

Rajapakse, who previously accommodated a few UNP defectors in his Cabinet, went ahead with the reshuffle and expanded the administration despite opposition from his Marxist electoral ally, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (the People's Liberation Front) and some rumblings from his own Sri Lanka - Freedom Party.

Analysts explained that the president, unsure of continuing support from the JVP which refused to take office in the government despite several offers, wanted to ensure a parliamentary majority independent of the JVP which is the third biggest party in the 225-member legislature.

The UNP, which entered into a memorandum of understanding with the government in October last year to support a peace process to end over three decades of ethnic war, said the MOU was off.

However, analysts do not expect the rightist party, weakened by defections and infighting since Rajapakse defeated its leader Ranil Wickremesinghe in the presidential election in November 2005, to present any major obstacles in a search for a negotiated peace process.

Rajapakse, concurrently defense and finance minister, retained the two key ministerial posts in the expanded 52-member Cabinet. But Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera was replaced by Rohitha Bogollagama, who defected to the government last year and held the investment promotion and industrial development portfolio.

''Samaraweera was not sidelined,'' the spokesman for the president's office said. ''He was holding two portfolios and he expressed a preference to continue as minister of ports and aviation and give up foreign affairs.''

Although weakened badly by the defections, Wickremesinghe will remain as leader of the opposition in parliament as his party still has more members of parliament than the JVP.

The defectors who do not wish to risk their membership of the legislature by quitting the party on whose ticket they were elected said they will remain members of the UNP and work with the government.

Although this group wished to sign their own MOU with Rajapakse, this had not been done up to Sunday's swearing in of the Cabinet at the presidential secretariat.

Sri Lankan President Names Cabinet With Opposition (Update1)

By Anusha Ondaatjie

Jan. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa formed a new Cabinet to accommodate members of the main opposition party who backed his economic and security policies for ending the island's civil war.

At least 18 members of the United National Party have pledged support for Rajapaksa's Sri Lanka Freedom Party-led coalition, Lucien Rajakarunanayake, a spokesman for the president's office, said by telephone. Ten UNP members were today sworn in to the Cabinet, he said. President Rajapaksa retained the Finance and Defense Ministry portfolios.

The SLFP and UNP in October signed a cooperation accord to form common economic and security policies. UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, a former prime minister and the architect of the 2002 peace agreement with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels, has said the agreement would be nullified if the government accepted his party members.

``This move is positive for the government's pro-peace platform,'' said Jehan Perera, director of the National Peace Council, a Sri Lankan non-governmental peace advocacy organization. ``It will make the government more stable and Ranil has few options, since the cooperation accord hasn't served any evident constructive purpose.''

Sri Lanka's peace process collapsed last year after fighting intensified in May in the east and spread to the northern Jaffna peninsula. Peace talks in Geneva in October collapsed without any progress between the government and LTTE, who are fighting for a separate homeland in areas they control in the north and east of the country.

Reaching a permanent peace agreement with the Tamil Tigers is crucial for Sri Lanka's tea- and textile-exporting economy, which has expanded every quarter since the cease-fire was signed.

Separate Homeland

The Sri Lankan Navy stopped an attack by the rebels on Colombo harbor, Agence France-Presse reported yesterday.

Rajapaksa in November 2005 beat Wickremesinghe in the presidential election on a pledge to renegotiate the cease-fire accord with the Tamil separatists.

Rajapaksa has said a separate homeland for Tamils is out of the question. Wickremesinghe's UNP supports talks with rebels and devolution of power as a way to end the bloodshed.

Rajapaksa today also swore in Rauf Hakeem, the leader of the main Muslim party, the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, to the Cabinet, Rajakarunanayake said.

The Central Bank of Sri Lanka said growth in the $24 billion economy slowed in the fourth quarter as the island grappled with renewed violence. Gross domestic product rose 7.5 percent in the three months ended September from a year earlier following a 7.6 percent gain in the second quarter, the Colombo- based central bank said Dec. 29.