The president’s air travel brings an end towards the rule of the effective Rajapaksa clan which has dominated politics in the South Asian country for the last two decades.
Protests contrary to the economic crisis have simmered for months and came to a head last weekend when thousands of people took over important government buildings within Colombo, blaming the particular Rajapaksas and their own allies for runaway inflation, corruption and a severe lack of gasoline and medicines.
Government sources plus aides said the president’s brothers, previous prime minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and previous finance minister Tulsi Rajapaksa, were nevertheless in Sri Lanka.
Gotabaya Rajapaksa, their wife and two bodyguards left the main international airport near Colombo aboard a Sri Lankan Air Pressure plane early on Wednesday, the air force stated in a statement.
A government resource and a person close to Rajapaksa said this individual was in Male, the main city of the Maldives. The particular president would probably proceed to another Asian country from there, the government source said.