Explained: The story of the rise and fall of Sri Lanka’s Rajapaksa family

Nothing has been heard from Gotabaya’s brother Mahinda Rajapaksa either. Mahinda, a former President, was ousted as Prime Minister on a day of violence exactly two months earlier, on May 9.

What went wrong for Gotabaya Rajapaksa?

Since March, when anti-government protesters found a rallying cry in “Gota Go Home”, the President was determined that he would not step down. His reasoning was that he had been elected “by 6.92 million people” which translates into a majority of 52.25 percent (Sri Lanka has an executive presidential system and the office is filled through direct elections), and that he was entitled to the rest of his five year term, which began in 2019.

But he clearly did not fathom the extent of public anger at the government’s mismanagement of the economy, in which he played a directly crippling role. Gotabaya appeared to believe that his image as the “saviour” of the country from terrorism — he was Defence Secretary in his brother Mahinda Rajapaksa’s government at the time of the LTTE’s military defeat in 2009 — would see him through.

So, is this the political end of the President?

Gotabaya Rajapaksa believed his planning of military strategies against the LTTE and later, the much praised beautification of the capital city, equipped him to run the country. But clearly it did not, and he goofed it up with his ill informed tax cuts, and his sudden edict to farmers to switch to organic farming. Along with the coronavirus pandemic, all of it added to the economic pain inflicted by the collapse of tourism in the aftermath of the Easter bombings.

Since March 31, when his private home in the Colombo suburb of Mirihana Pangiriwatta came under attack from hundreds of protesters, the writing had been on the wall.

As the calls from the street for him to resign grew louder, Gotabaya could have chosen to step down any time in the last four months, but he made his brothers Mahinda, Basil and Chamal resign, leaving the main demand of the people unmet. He also brought in Ranil Wickremesinghe as Prime Minister, thinking that would pacify the protesters. Instead it only appears to have increased the anger of the people.

Now Gotabaya has had to flee like a despot pushed out by the people instead of the democratically “elected by a majority” leader that he had proclaimed he was.

How did the Rajapaksa family rise to the pinnacle of power in Sri Lanka?

Sri Lanka’s history in the first two decades of the new millennium is largely the history of the rise of the Rajapaksas. Their spectacular comeback over 2018-19 after a humiliating defeat at the hustings just four years earlier (in 2015) offers insights into the tenacity of a political dynasty that is perhaps South Asia’s biggest and perhaps its most brazenly nepotisitic.

The rise to power of Mahinda Rajapaksa began in 2004, when he was appointed Prime Minister during the presidency of Chandrika Kumaratunga Bandaranaike — a decision that she later said had been her biggest mistake. Once he got power, Mahinda was unstoppable. He won the 2005 presidential election, and then made the decision to launch an all-out war in the north and east against the LTTE. His brother Gotabaya, who had earlier served in the Sri Lankan Army, played the key role of Defence Secretary.

The victory over the Tigers strengthened the Rajapaksas’ grip on power. In the Sinhalese south, Mahinda and Gotabaya ascended to god-like figures in the eyes of the majority Sinhala-Buddhist community for freeing them from the terror that the LTTE had unleashed on them.

Mahinda won a second term as President, and had the Constitution amended to remove the two-term bar. He was confident that he would be president for life.

Continuing as Mahinda’s Defence Secretary, Gotabaya became a parallel power centre, wielding influence by spreading fear. He had given his office a regal touch, his throne-like chair placed at a level above those of his visitors in a statement of power. On his watch, dozens of people who were known critics of the government were abducted, some never to be seen again.

Lasantha Wickrematunge, editor of the Sunday Leader, was killed in 2009. Prageeth Ekneligoda, a cartoonist, who went missing in 2010, has not been seen since. This was also the time when the Rajapaksas gave free reign to the Bodu Bala Sena, a Buddhist extremist group that triggered several incidents of anti-Muslim violence.

Their youngest brother Basil was minister in charge of economic development, and controlled all investments in Sri Lanka. Chamal, the eldest, was Speaker. At the time, according to one estimate, as many as 40 Rajapaksas held one or another office, and between them, controlled most of the government’s finances. Under their grip, freedoms suffered.

Internationally, Mahinda’s proximity to China began to worry New Delhi at a time the regional giant had begun making inroads with India’s south Asian neighbours. The United States too was concerned about China’s growing claims in the Indian Ocean region.

There was concern too that the Rajapaksa regime was not moving on post-war reconciliation with the Tamil community, and redressal of complaints of rights violations during the war. India’s calls to address Tamil political demands were brushed off.

What happened in 2015 and afterward?

Mahinda had begun taking voters for granted and his political arrogance had begun to grate. In the 2015 presidential election, he suffered defeat.

Mahinda’s drubbing in the presidential and parliamentary election was humiliating but the brothers bided their time. The Sri Lanka Peramuna Podujana was their relaunch vehicle. When the Sirisena-Wickremsinghe government collapsed under the weight of its own contradictions, its failures shockingly evident in the inability to prevent the IS-inspired 2019 Easter Day terrorist attacks, the Rajapaksas lined up their ducks.

Later that year Gotabaya Rajapaksa would be voted in as President — after he reluctantly gave up his American citizenship to qualify as a candidate — on the back of people’s fears that terrorism would return to Sri Lanka.

Mahinda, who could not contest the 2019 presidential election because the two-term bar on the presidency had been restored by the previous government, led the SLPP’s landslide win in the parliamentary election, and became the Prime Minister.