Ranil Wickremesinghe: Can veteran’s appointment as Sri Lanka’s new PM stave off more protests?

‘They need to dissolve the government and call for fresh elections,’ says one protester

Veteran opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe was sworn in as the prime minister of Sri Lanka on Thursday as protests against the president rage across the country amid a crippling economic crisis.

Mr Wickremesinghe, 73, who lost the parliamentary elections in 2020 took over the prime minister’s office for the sixth time after Mahinda Rajapaksa resigned from the post earlier this week when anti-government protests turned violent. Mr Rajapaksa, his son, Namal, and 15 allies were barred from leaving the country by a court order.

Since April, thousands of Sri Lankans have assembled at Galle Face, one of the country’s swankiest areas in the capital Colombo, to demand the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa for his mishandling of the economic crisis.