Has Ravi Karunanayake left the UNP and joined the SJB for the local government elections?

As political parties prepare for the upcoming local government elections, misleading information about political parties and leaders are being published on social media. This is an investigation we did to find the accuracy of a post that was published in a misleading manner.

Social Media Posts :

A social media post was circulated stating, “Ravi is leaving Ranil, and will work with SJB for local government” (“රවි, රනිල් හැරයයි! පළාත් පාලනයට රවී සජබ එක්ක වැඩ!”).

Facebook | Archived Link

This post was circulated through WhatsApp as well.

Here is how we checked the accuracy of this post.

Fact Check :

We checked whether the mainstream media had reported that MP Ravi Karunanayake will leave the United National Party (UNP) and join the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) in the local government election.

Accordingly, we noticed that an article in this regard has been published on the website of ‘Anidda’ newspaper on 26th.

It stated that, “Ravi Karunanayake, who contested for the parliamentary election under the leadership of United National Party leader Ranil Wickremesinghe and was elected to the Parliament under the cylinder symbol, is reportedly ready to work with the Samagi Jana Balawegaya for the local government elections.” (“එක්සත් ජාතික පක්ෂ නායක රනිල් වික්‍රමසිංහගේ නායකත්වයෙන් පසුගිය මහ මැතිවරණයට තරග කළ සිලින්ඩරය ලකුණ යටතේ පාර්ලිමේන්තුවට තේරී පත්වූ රවී කරුණානායක මහතා පළාත් පාලන මැතිවරණය සඳහා සමගි ජන බලවේගය සමඟ කටයුතු කිරීමට සූදානම්”)

Anidda | Archived Link

Therefore, we decided to contact several relevant parties in this regard to confirm this news.

Ravi Karunanayake

We inquired the Parliamentarian Ravi Karunanayake’s media unit to confirm whether he has decided to leave the United National Party and join the Samagi Jana Balawegaya. His media secretary stated that it is a completely false information and that no such decision has been made.

Samagi Jana Balawegaya

The media unit of the Samagi Jana Balawegaya stated that there is no alliance between the Samagi Jana Balawegaya and Ravi Karunanayke, and that it is a completely false information.

The Samagi Jana Balawegaya has decided to contest for all the seats alone under the ‘Telephone’ symbol for the upcoming local government elections. In it they state that although various parties engage in deal politics with parties or individuals who have bankrupted the country, the Samagi Jana Balawegaya has consistently been a populist party and will not join such bankrupt political deals.

Releasing a media announcement, they further state the although the United National Party (Elephant symbol), the Cylinder symbol, and the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramune (Lotus flower symbol), have made various statements on various occassions regarding their affliations with Samagi Jana Balawegaya, they have no dealings or political affliations with those parties. They further stated that Samagi Jana Balawegaya act based on principles.

Accordingly, they state that if a candidate is willing to join the Samagi Jana Balawegaya, he can join if only that candidate is someone who is dedicated to serving the people without any privileges or benifts. Otherwise, it is stated that it is not possible to join the Samagi Jana Balawegaya with the expectation of benifits and privileges, and the the Samagi Jana Balawegaya has rejected such bankrupt policies.

Furthermore, they state that using newspapers and various websites that are biased towards political parties, Ravi Karunanayake and a group of others who were elected to Parliament under the cylinder symbol are launching false information claiming that they will work together with the Samagi Jana Balawegaya in the upcoming local governement. The party’s media unit point out that they are false information.

United National Party

The media unit of the United National Party Chairman Vajira Abeywardene released a statement, and the Chairman also expressed his views. They confirmed that this news is false, and that MP Ravi Karunanayake has not yet made any announcement stating that he will be seperating for the United National Party and joining the Samagi Jana Balawegaya.

P.S. : If Mr. Ravi Karunanayke decided to join the SJB in the future, we hope to update this article with confirmed information.

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Conclusion:

Our investigation shows that the news circulated claiming that UNP MP Ravi Karunanayake will work with the Samagi Jana Balawegaya in the upcoming local governement elections are false. It is confirmed by the Samagi Jana Balawegaya, United National Party and Ravi Karunanayake.