Moulana returns from US to back Rajapaksa
Former UNP National List MP Ali Zahir Moulana will join President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s presidential election campaign this week. Moulana quit his seat in early 2004 and took refuge in the US fearing an LTTE assassination attempt on his life over helping one-time LTTE strongman Karuna to reach Colombo.
Well informed sources told The Sunday Island that President Rajapaksa had accommodated Moulana on the Sri Lankan mission in Washington over a year ago. Now it was Moulana’s turn to help the President with his campaign, sources said.These sources said that Moulana played a critical role in previous UNP campaigns in the East. The UNP had to accommodate Moulana on its National List in keeping with a controversial understanding with the SLMC which barred the UNP from fielding any Muslims in some districts at the April 2004 parliamentary polls.
These sources said that several other political appointees accommodated at Sri Lankan missions abroad are back in Colombo to support the President’s campaign.They said that Moulana would come out strongly against the UNP leadership for cold shouldering him over the Karuna affair.
