Chairman of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna GL Peiris made a special statement today and announced that 13 MPs including himself will sit in the opposition in Parliament. With the decision of this group, the government has lost its majority power.
In the last general election, the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna won 149 seats and the number of seats held by the ruling party had exceeded 150 with the addition of members from the opposition to the government on various occasions, including when the 20th amendment was passed.
At present, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party is working independently and the group including Wimal-Gammanpi-Vasu is also sitting in the opposition. Headed by Anura Priyadarshana Yapa, 06 MPs work as a separate group and the GL-Dallas group also joined the opposition today.
Due to this situation, the number of MP seats owned by the ruling party has decreased to less than 100.
In order to pass the interim budget presented to Parliament yesterday, at least 113 MPs must be in favor of it. The independent groups from the ruling party have so far not expressed a definite decision whether they support or oppose the budget.
