Kumar Gunaratnam will not be surrendered: FSP

25 February 2015 02:43 pm

Frontline Socialist Party (FSP) Politbureau Member Pubudu Jagoda today said Kumar Gunaratnam would not be surrendered to the Immigration and Emigration Department despite its calling for his surrender.

Mr. Jagoda said Mr. Gunaratnam would not be surrendered to the Immigration and Emigration Department since it was a political matter and added they would resolve it with the ministry concerned.

He said they had submitted an application to the Immigration and Emigration Department and the ministry requesting Sri Lankan citizenship for Mr. Gunaratnam but there had been no positive response so far.

When contacted, the Immigration and Emigration Controller General M.N. Ranasinghe said a removal order would be issued against Mr. Gunaratnam to expel him from the country after he was produced in the Immigration and Emigration Department.

Meanwhile, Mr. Gunaratnam issuing a statement said the government had launched a rapid campaign to deport him without making any attempt to expedite the delaying 100-day programme of the government.   

“The government has not been able to take any action against economic criminals, drug dealers and fraudsters as it promised. The discussion about abolishing of the executive presidency has faded away and come to a level of amending it. Even though it was not practical without changing the current New Liberal Economic and Political system, people were expecting the government to do it as promised,” he said.

Mr. Gunaratnam said he and some other people had to leave the country because of threats of engaging in politics and that it did not happen on their own accord, and added that there had been such an atmosphere at that time.

“I would have been on the disappearance list if it had not been for the pressure exerted on the government by the national and international forces when I was abducted and threatened that I would be killed on  April 7, 2012, he added. (Ajith Siriwardana and Darshana Sanjeewa)