Removing Azwar, a great relief for Muslims – Amir

All Ceylon Muslim Congress (ACMC) National List MP Ameer Ali, who pledged his support to Common Opposition candidate Maithripala Sirisena said today that removing former National List MP A.H.M. Azwar from Parliament was the biggest support extended to Muslims by President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

“Azwar was the one who acted as the government representative to protect the government when there were allegations of harassments against Muslims,” Mr. Ali said.

Mr. Ali said he had been deceived for four years that he would be appointed as a National List MP, and said he had accepted it this time after his party and supporters requested him to do so.

“We had not taken a decision to support Maithripala Sirisena when I accepted the post. We took that decision at the last minute. President says in election rallies that it was a shame to accept it and cross over. But I ask him whether National List MP Tissa Attanayake was taken in after giving another National List MP to the opposition,” he said.

He said there was no one to organise election campaign for President Rajapaksa in the Mannar district during 2005 election but, it was only him who did it.

 
All Ceylon Muslim Congress (ACMC) leader and former Minister Rishard Badiudeen said that they deserved to be included in the National List because they had obtained three parliamentary seats but had not been given any National List status, similar to the other parties such as JHU, Dew Gunasekara, Tissa Witharana and Rajive Wijesinghe were offered with National List posts.

“We have a right to obtain a National List post because we endeavoured to bring President Rajapaksa to power in 2005 and 2010. But we were not offered such a post as promised,” he said.

Mr. Badiudeen appealed to the people to cast their vote for Maithripala Sirisena, if they really wanted to safeguard the peace achieved by the dedication of security forces.

“There was a peaceful environment in the country for every community to live peacefully from 2005 to 2010, but it had changed during the last four years. Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) was formed with the blessing of the government to create communal disharmony that resulted in several incidents such as the Aluthgama incident”, he said.

He said that people would not vote for racism and stressed that they strongly rejected hatred.(Ajith Siriwardana)