The ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) is expecting President Ranil Wickremesinghe to appoint a new Cabinet of Ministers with more Ministries being given to “real SLPPers”, according to the Party's General Secretary and MP Sagara Kariyawasam.

It was recently reported that SLPP National Organiser Basil Rajapaksa had requested Wickremesinghe that some more Ministerial posts be given to SLPP MPs.

When The Daily Morning contacted Kariyawasam and queried about the situation with regard to the said request, he said: "We made that request at the very beginning and it is still valid. I do not see any reason as to why it should become invalid. From the beginning, our request to the President was to appoint a new Cabinet with more Ministries being given to real SLPPers, but he prefers to go with the final Cabinet of former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa. That does not mean that our request is invalid."

He also said that the request has however not been fulfilled due to “fair” reasons that Wickremesinghe is having, and that the SLPP has a sound understanding of the situation. "We genuinely made that request, but it has not been fulfilled yet. We understand that the President is having fair reasons. There was a serious destabilisation in the country and we do not want to face such a situation again," added Kariyawasam.

Wickremesinghe, who entered Parliament through the National List, was initially functioning as an Opposition MP. However, in mid-2022 he was appointed as the Prime Minister in the face of massive protests against then-President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and the SLPP led Government. He was thereafter elected as the President with the majority support of the SLPP in a parliamentary vote held following the resignation of Rajapaksa from the presidency in July 2022. Wickremesinghe did not dissolve the Cabinet appointed by his predecessor and instead made some changes to it from time to time.