Is Mahinda Rajapaksa planning to stage a public rally against the current regime?

Posts are widely circulated on social media stating that a public meeting would be held against the current coalition government under the leadership of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. 

Social Media Posts

Viral posts tried to convince the public that former president Mahinda Rajapaksa would hold a public meeting against the current government.  Accordingly, the purported meeting to be held on the 2^nd of April at S. De S Jayasinghe Hall in Dehiwala municipality is being organized by the ‘Rajya Sampath Surakimu movement’ and the ‘Joint Trade Union Council.’

Facebook | Archived 

Below are some of the viral FB posts in Sinhala.

We decided to do a fact-check on this.

Fact Check 

Initially, we observed whether any mainstream media had reported such a purported meeting to be held recently under the patronage of Mahinda Rajapaksa. Yet we did not come across any such reports.

Also, we performed a keyword check to determine whether the said event organizers, the ‘Rajya Sampath Surakimu’ movement, and the Joint Trade Union Council had issued any notice of this kind. However, this also did not yield any results.

Later, on the backdrop of these viral messages, the official Facebook page of Mahinda Rajapaksa published a statement declaring that the social media posts were false and that such a public meeting would not be held on April 02, as seen below.

Facebook | Archived Link

Also, Mr. Rohan Welivita, former media director to PM Mahinda Rajapaksa, confirmed that such a rally would not occur, and the viral claims are totally baseless.

To investigate whether such a public meeting was scheduled at Dehiwala SDS Jayasinghe Hall, we also inquired with the Dehiwala-Galkissa Municipal Council officials, which control the hall premises. They, too, confirmed that the hall had yet to be allocated to hold such a meeting on the 2^nd of April.

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Conclusion

Our investigation shows that a public rally will not be held on April 2nd at SDS Jayasinghe Hall in Dehiwala under the leadership of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa with the theme “Let’s rally against the current coalition government to stop the sale of national resources.”The Official Facebook page of Mahinda Rajapaksa confirms that there would not be any public rally on April 2^nd against the current regime and that the viral posts were false and fabricated.