Sri Lanka's ruling coalition late on Friday night pledged to revive a pact with a radical Marxist group after a snap election in December as more lawmakers defected to the Opposition.
Under the deal, the Marxist Peoples' Liberation Front (JVP) wanted the government to shelve a Norwegian-brokered peace bid to end a bloody separatist war in the country and roll back economic reforms in return for support for the government. ''We will form the next government together with the JVP and implement the remaining provisions of our agreement,'' ruling party spokesman, Mangala Samaraweera said at a news conference.
Samaraweera's statement came as more defections hit the ruling coalition from which nine lawmakers crossed over to sit with the Opposition in Parliament earlier this week. Three deputy ministers of the government and the deputy speaker last night said they would resign from their posts, leaving the government with just 107 seats in the 225-seat assembly, which includes the 10-seat support of the Marxists.
Last year's general election in October returned a hung Parliament and the president's decision to call for a snap election this week set the stage for another bitterly contested poll.
Last year more than 70 people died in clashes between rival parties and bomb attacks by Tamil separatists in Sri Lanka's north and east. Samaraweera said that neither party was likely to win an outright majority at the general election but that the ruling peoples' alliance would get a larger vote.
Samaraweera, who is also the deputy minister of finance, was speaking at a news conference to announce a series of unexpected tax cuts and spending measures a day after the Parliament was dissolved.
He did not give an estimate of the cost of these measures to the war-burdened country which has been fighting Tamil tiger guerrillas in the past 18 years in an ethnic conflict that has claimed more than 64,000 lives. Bureau Report