Sri Lanka opposition leader Sajith Premadasa, on Tuesday, withdrew from the race to become president of the island nation. Premadasa extended support to rival candidate Dullas Alahapperuma.
"For the greater good of my country that I love and the people I cherish, I hereby withdraw my candidacy for the position of president," Premadasa wrote on Twitter. “our alliance and our opposition partners will work hard towards making Dullas Alahapperuma the winner,” he wrote.
Alahapperuma, who was a Cabinet minister in the previous Rajapaksa government is a senior member of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) and a former journalist. Voting for the president will take place on July 20. 225 members of the house will vote in a secret ballot.
Sri Lankans continue to queue up at petrol pumps across the country every day amid a fuel shortage. People are ditching cars and motorbikes for bicycles for their daily commute. The country, which has been hit with a severe economic crisis faces a shortage of essentials including medicines. People in the country have been protesting rising fuel prices for months.
In the meantime, security has been beefed up in and around Sri Lanka's Parliament complex on Tuesday after the Speaker lodged a complaint with the Inspector General of Police calling for a detailed investigation to be conducted into certain inflammatory posts published on social media threatening Members of Parliament.
The complaint by Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena came hours before Parliament was poised to accept the nominations for the post of president.
--With PTI inputs