‘President called me four times; I didn’t pick up’-Says JVP Leader

| by Niranjala Ariyanwansha

( March 12, 2014, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Leader of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), Anura Kumara Dissanayake, said that while he had received four calls from the President on 3 February, presumably to congratulate him on being appointed as the Party Leader the previous day (2 February), he had declined to answer any of them.

He opined that the President's motive behind the congratulatory calls was not to actually congratulate him but to do so and get media publicity for it.

"I knew when he called four times that this was a publicity stunt. He wants to score points by deceit and to then publish them in the following day's newspapers," he said.

He went on to say: "On my birthday in 2013, he called and wished me, and I thought only the two of us knew about our conversation, only to find out differently from that week's Sunday newspapers. It is he who talks to the press."