Ranil Wickremesinghe has sworn-in as the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka

Ranil Wickremesinghe has sworn-in as the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka for fourth time. He was administered the oath of office by President Maithripala Sirisena at the oath taking ceremony held at Presidential Secretariat in Colombo. Immediately after oath taking ceremony, two main parties in the country Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the United National Party (UNP) inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to form national unity government and work together in the parliament. Ranil Wickremesighe has held the position of Prime Minister of the country on three earlier occasions i.e. in 1993-94, 2002-2004 and from January 2015 to August 2015. He holds record of being Member of Parliament continuously without losing his seat for the last 38 years in Sri Lankan history. Background In recently concluded Sri Lankan parliamentary election 2015, UNP led by Mr. Wickremesinghe had emerged single largest party by winning 106 seats. They were short by seven members to become majority party in the 225-member parliament. SLFP which is loyal to President Maithripala Sirisena had won 95 seats. In this election, Mr. Wickremesinghe had secured a record 5 lakh preferential votes from the Colombo constituency which is the highest number of votes polled by a candidate in Sri Lanka’s electoral history. Comment Wickremesinghe has a high reputation of being an honest and progressive politician in Sri Lanka who has always tried to bring reconciliation between the various communities. During his earlier stints as Prime Minister, Mr. Wickremesinghe had marked friendly and close relations with India.