{"id":74065,"date":"2021-08-24T03:33:09","date_gmt":"2021-08-24T08:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=74065"},"modified":"2021-08-24T04:19:55","modified_gmt":"2021-08-24T09:19:55","slug":"visionary-leader-mangala-samaraweera-afflicted-with-covid-passes-away-t-private-hospital-in-colombo-outspoken-politician-from-matara-was-a-true-patriot-and-radical-centrist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=74065","title":{"rendered":"Visionary Leader Mangala Samaraweera Afflicted with COVID Passes Away at Private Hospital in Colombo; Outspoken Politician From Matara was a True Patriot and Radical Centrist"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sri Lanka\u2019s former finance minister Mangala Samaraweera passed away Tuesday ( Aug 24) in hospital where he was being treated for Coronavirus, a coordinator for the former minister said.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The 65-year-old Samaraweera contracted the virus earlier this month and was receiving intensive care unit (ICU) treatment at the Lanka Hospital, despite being fully vaccinated.<\/p>\n

When unconfirmed reports surfaced last week that Samaraweera passed, sources close to him said he was in fact on the mend and was responding well to treatment.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Samaraweera had held key portfolios in the cabinets of former presidents Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, Mahinda Rajapaksa and Maithripala Sirisena.<\/p>\n

An outspoken politician hailing from the Matara district, Samaraweera left parliamentary politics in 2020, focusing his abilities on forming a broader alliance of like-minded, independent liberal thinkers.<\/p>\n

Most recently, he made headlines for his remark at the launch of a new movement named True Patriots that the main opposition Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB) and the ruling Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) are two sides of the same coin.<\/p>\n

To the critics of his tenure as minister of finance, Samaraweera said: \u201cEven though I am a textile designer, I was able to bring fiscal discipline in this country as the finance minister for the first time since 1953.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI am always proud of two things. The first one is that, through the Sudhu Nelum Mal Movement (a peace movement under President Kumaratunga i the 1990s), I was able to help and reconstruct the Jaffna library and hand it over to the people. I am also proud of privatising Sri Lanka\u2019s telecom sector. Before 1997, everybody had to wait 10-12 years to get a telephone line,\u201d he said at what would be his final press conference.<\/p>\n

Samaraweera was also known for being a staunch defender of minority rights and a vocal proponent of liberal democracy. He often courted controversy, being one of a handful of Sri Lankan politicians to openly challenge cultural norms and their self-appointed purveyors.<\/p>\n

Courtesy:Economy Next<\/em><\/p>\n

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Sri Lanka\u2019s former finance minister Mangala Samaraweera passed away Tuesday ( Aug 24) in hospital where he was being treated for Coronavirus, a coordinator for the former minister said. The 65-year-old Samaraweera contracted the virus earlier this month and was receiving intensive care unit (ICU) treatment at the Lanka Hospital, despite being fully vaccinated. When …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Visionary Leader Mangala Samaraweera Afflicted with COVID Passes Away at Private Hospital in Colombo; Outspoken Politician From Matara was a True Patriot and Radical Centrist’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74065"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=74065"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74065\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74067,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74065\/revisions\/74067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=74065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=74065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=74065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}