Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa on Tuesday filed a petition in the country’s Supreme Court against a lower court’s interim order that restrained him and his Cabinet from acting in their official capacities till a writ petition filed against them holding office is heard.

The plea, filed by advocates on Rajapaksa’s behalf, claims that the order of the Court of Appeal is unconstitutional, and that the court has no authority to issue such directives, adaderana.lk reported. Rajapaksa’s advocates have urged the Supreme Court to issue an order declaring the lower court’s directive as unlawful, and sought an interim order preventing its implementation.

Advertisement

The 122 legislators in Sri Lanka’s Parliament, who filed the writ petition before the Court of Appeal, have been mentioned as respondents in Rajapaksa’s plea.

The island nation has been in a state of political turmoil since President Maithripala Sirisena ousted Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and replaced him with Rajapaksa, a former president, on October 26. He suspended Parliament to prevent a vote, then lifted the suspension, but dissolved it again and called snap elections. Rajapaksa’s government subsequently lost two trust motions in Parliament. The Supreme Court is hearing petitions against Sirisena’s decision to dissolve Parliament.

Will never make Wickremesinghe prime minister: Sirisena

Sirisena claimed on Tuesday that the political unrest in the country will come to an end within a week. The president told a convention of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party that his decision to sack Wickremesinghe was the correct one.

Advertisement

“Ranil Wickremesinghe destroyed the country and the United National Party,” he alleged. “To some extent he also destroyed me. I will never make Wickremesinghe the prime minister again even if all 225 MPs in parliament sign and request me to do so.”

Sirisena claimed that he respects the judiciary’s decisions, but the opinion of the Sri Lankan people on the institution differs.