Massive crowds expected in Colombo for May Day

by S. Selvakumar

The main Opposition UNP opting to hold three separate May Day rallies, Colombo will be a sea of blue and red on Wednesday with hundreds of thousands attending the UPFA rally.”We hope to have a mammoth rally presided over by President Mahinda Rajapaksa,” UPFA General Secretary and Minister Susil Premajayantha said.

The SLFP would focus on a membership drive, this time around, he said.

The UPFA allies, the Communist Party, LSSP, CWC and the National Freedom Front will hold separate rallies in Colombo.

The UNP’s Colombo rally will be confined to the precincts of Siri Kotha where affiliated trade unions would meet and a second rally would be held in Kurunegala and the third in Badulla, the party’s senior Vice President and parliamentarian John Amaratunga said. Party leader Ranil Wickremesinghe is slated to preside at the Kurunegala rally. Asked why the party opted for three separate venues, Amaratunga said that in the present cost-of-living scenario they did not want the people in the provinces to travel all the way to Colombo and instead decided to go to the people in the provinces.

The UPFA’s rally would commence at the Colombo Town Hall premises and proceed to Campbell Park through Nelum Pokuna Mawatha, Horton Place and D.S. Senanayake Junction. The UNP’s former Deputy leader and parliamentarian Sajith Premadasa will commemorate his father, the late R. Premadasa’s 20th death anniversary in the form of a May Day rally at the foot of the statue of the late President at Hulftsdorp, as he has done in the past.

UNP dissident Group leader and Puttalam District parliamentarian Palitha Range Bandara when asked about his preparations for the May Day said that his group would not commemorate May Day and not attend the rallies organised by UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe.