President's re-election will defeat unpatriotic forces

Shirley WIJESINGHE

The time is ripe for the re-election of President Mahinda Rajapaksa to defeat the efforts to reverse the victory over terrorism, Plantation Industries Minister D.M. Jayaratne said.

The people should rally around the President ignoring party and colour differences, he said.

He was addressing a mass rally at Panvilathenna in Kandy where over 500 UNPers in Panvlathenna village got SLFP membership.

"We were able to win our first national freedom in 1948 and the second against the three decade old LTTE terrorism. The biggest challenge before the nation today is to win the economic war at this decisive moment. No candidate other than President Rajapaksa is most suitable to achieve this task," Jayaratne said. Jayaratne added that it is not a problem to President Rajapaksa to achieve development targets when compared with the former Presidents in the country's history.

He expressed hope that the people will teach a good lesson to the UNP-JVP venture in the upcoming Presidential Election by re-electing President Mahinda Rajapaksa.