Opposition and SJB Leader Sajith Premadasa told Parliament on Thursday that incumbent President Ranil Wickremesinghe colluded with the former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa during the 2019 Presidential elections to work for his defeat.

“President Wickremesinghe says that he would help me to become the President one day and also assures that he would instruct me on how to manage my affairs better in the opposition leader post. I know well how he had colluded with Gotabaya Rajapaksa in 2019 presidential election to help me. I do not need his help. What we achieve or where we would go won’t be determined by political deals. I would achieve what I want with the votes of 22 million people. We must abhor the deal culture in our politics.

“I neither have a need nor hope to warm the opposition leader chair for 21 years. But I would like to state that we have done our best to better the status quo of the health and education sectors in this country even remaining as an opposition party. The incumbent president up to this date did not hinder any of our work.

“He when he was the prime minister made a request from the opposition to help rebuild this country. We did that to the best of our ability. To build this nation or to work for the people, we do not need to get ministerial posts. We are strong enough to work for the betterment of our people. We’ll continue to do so. Therefore we do not get to the places we aspire to through political deals but with the blessings of people,” Premadasa said.