Maithripala denounces misleading newspaper reports

by Chamikara Weerasinghe

Agriculture, Environment and Mahaweli Development Minister Maithripala Sirisena yesterday vehemently denounced Tamil newspaper reports for involving his name in what seemed to be misleading story after relying on two persons who were believed to have made a re-entry to the LTTE after disbanding from the same's breakaway faction, led by Karuna.

According to what they had published sourcing these two persons who were believed to have been members of Karuna faction before they joined the LTTE, had told at an LTTE-conducted press conference, that I had met members of LTTE breakaway group Karuna at Karadiyanaru prior to the Presidential Election and asked their help to ensure the victory of our candidate.

According to them I had asked them to get at least around 10,000 votes in my favour. "This quote itself has no foundation because there was no way I could get that number of votes from my electorate in the Polonnaruwa district because it has about only 4,500 Tamil people who are eligible to cast votes," the Minister explained.

This stands to prove that these news reports were rubbish, he said.

"I came across a certain weekend newspaper published by the UNP to have reported the same rubbish. I wrote to them about the untruthfulness of their report," he said.