Sri Lankan opposition leader did not 'announce plan to join forces with ruling party'

The misleading post was shared here on April 16, 2023, with a picture of Premadasa and text in Sinhala language that reads: "We will begin a new political journey with the UNP. We will unite and work together with Ranil Wickremesinghe."

"Sajith's supporters lambasted Ranil and vice versa. But the million-dollar question is: after criticising each other, how will they now come to work together?" the translated post caption reads. "My bad, these politicians have no shame."

The woman pictured in the bottom right-hand corner of the post is Sri Lankan actress Damitha Abeyratne, who has backed Premadasa and his party, The Colombo Gazette reported (archived link).

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Screenshot of the Facebook post captured on April 17, 2023.

Premadasa -- who was formerly a UNP deputy leader -- led a fraction and split from the party in 2020 following his failed run for president as a UNP candidate at the 2019 presidential election (archived link).

He said at the time he decided to split from the party because he could not work with the UNP's leader, President Wickremesinghe.

The claim began to circulate after unconfirmed reports suggested that several SJB members were in talks to join the Wickremesinghe-led government (archived link).

Sri Lanka's unprecedented economic crisis since late 2021 has caused severe shortages of food, fuel and medicines. It led to months of protests that toppled Wickremesinghe's predecessor Gotabaya Rajapaksa.

The same image was shared on Facebook alongside a similar claim here and here. It was also shared widely on WhatsApp.

Comments from some users indicated they believed Premadasa genuinely made the announcement in April 2023.

"New Year gifts from the SJB. Where are the SJB supporters? Where are your criticisms of Ranil now?" one user wrote.

Another user wrote, "This just goes to show that none of the mainstream parties is interested in changing the political system -- my vote is for the compass this time."

However, a spokesperson for the SJB -- former member of parliament Mujibur Rahman -- told AFP on April 17 that Premadasa had not made the remarks as claimed by the misleading posts.

"SJB has not made any decision to join the government. These are deliberate falsehoods spun by government supporters," he said.

Premadasa also issued a statement rejecting the posts as "fake news", which was also published by the SJB's official Facebook page (archived link).

"Pro-government supporters have begun circulating a claim that the SJB and myself, are planning to join the government to take on ministerial positions and other benefits. We vehemently reject this claim and we condemn this false news," the statement read.

Old press conference

The image in the posts was taken from a 2020 press conference after Premadasa founded the SJB and asked his former colleague Wickremesinghe to join his party.

It was recorded by Sri Lankan outlet Ada Derana on its English-language Facebook page (archived link).

The outlet aired the same footage on February 26, 2020.

"This morning I met Ranil Wickremesinghe with some of our (SJB) leaders and invited him to unite with us, cast aside personal agendas and move forward together as the SJB. We invite similar thinking groups to join us in creating a new Sri Lanka," Premadasa says in the clip.

A Facebook page named "Ceylon Newsline" -- which has a visible watermark in the misleading posts -- uploaded the clip again on April 16, 2023 with a Sinhala-language caption that reads: "Here is what Sajith thought of Ranil in 2020".

It was part of a report about how the opposition leader criticised Wickremesinghe in 2023, after having indicated he wanted to work with the president in 2020.

Below is a screenshot comparison of the image in the misleading posts (left) and a screenshot of the video from Ceylon Newsline (right):

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Screenshot comparison of the misleading posts' image (left) and a screenshot of the video from Ceylon Newsline (right).