Lankan oppn ready for ensuing snap polls

Opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe said his party was ready to face either a parliamentary or presidential election ahead of the due dates between August-November next year.

`There is a great debate within the government whether to sacrifice president first or the parliament,’ Wickremesinghe said. `Whichever comes first, we are ready to face a national election and whoever is sacrificed first will go like the light brigade’.

Wickremesinghe who is a former prime minister said their `listening campaign’ that included seven questions on cost of living, employment education and the country’s Tamil separatist conflict was fashioned on a campaign launched by the Labour Party in Britain before the 1997 elections. With the new initiative, the opposition was moving from reacting to government actions to taking positive policy initiatives, Wickremesinghe said.

However, he said his party will also push ahead with a campaign protesting the privatisation of the national airline and handing over its full management to Emirates of Dubai.

He said there was corruption involved in the purchase of three more Airbus A-330 aircraft for the national carrier which last week changed its name from Air Lanka to Sri Lankan Airlines.

There was no immediate reaction either from Sri Lankan Airlines or the ruling People’s Alliance to the opposition charge of corruption in the latest airbus deal.

Earlier, when the government sold an equity slice of the national carrier to Emirate and the airline committed to buy six new Airbus A-330 aircraft, the UNP lodged a complaint against the deal with the independent Bribery and Corruption Commission.

However, the commission has become virtually defunct with the government trying to oust independent commissioners who refused to step down in line with a request by President Chandrika Kumaratunga.