Former President and incumbent Opposition Parliamentarian and Chairman of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), Maithripala Sirisena and former President and former SLFP Chair, Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga – who were at loggerheads in recent times – saw a reunion at the event to commemorate the late Prime Ministers S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike and Sirimavo Bandaranaike  – the former the SLFP Founder, and the late Speaker of Parliament Anura Bandaranaike yesterday (26).

The event was held yesterday morning at the Bandaranaike Memorial in Horagolla, Attanagalle. Kumaratunga and Sunethra Bandaranaike presided over the event, which was attended by many.

Sirisena did not attend the Bandaranaike commemoration event at Horagolla for a few years, and instead organised separate events to commemorate the Bandaranaikes with SLFP members.

However, the SLFP is seeing a crisis with the recent decision of Sirisena to remove its General Secretary and Opposition MP Dayasiri Jayasekara, and suspend his party membership along with those of several SLFP members supporting the Government by accepting Ministerial and State Ministerial posts in contrast to the party's decision to not do so.

Prime Minister Dinesh Gunawardena, former Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, Opposition MPs Prof. G.L. Peiris and Kumara Welgama, several SLFP MPs who recently accepted Cabinet and State Ministerial posts such as Nimal Siripala de Silva and Mahinda Amaraweera, and many other political figures attended the event.

Last year, the SLFP had organised a separate event to commemorate the Bandaranaikes at the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall in Colombo. Sirisena and Kumaratunga had been criticising each other for years, particularly after the former's decision to suspend the latter’s SLFP membership for her alleged support of the Government led by President Ranil Wickremesinghe.