Chief ministerial candidate Rauff Hakeem told ‘Lanka Dissent’ that the Ministry of Defence has ordered service providers to interrupt mobile phone services in the Eastern Province, which goes to polls tomorrow (May 10th).
He also said that the government was preparing to stage a massive vote rigging on election day and the move seems to prevent the outside world from getting information on those violations in the East.
As a former Minister of Posts and Telecommunications, Mr. Hakeem said the Defence Ministry could give such orders only on matters pertaining to national security.
The chief ministerial candidate added that he would initiate legal action against any service provider and other responsible officials if such undue interruptions are effected tomorrow.
3 Comments
chanuka
This is unconfirmed news, but we publish here because if true it is a serious policy issue.
Please feel free to discuss.
Sanjana
The Centre for Monitoring Elections Violence (CMEV) has called upon the Elections Commissioner to take action to prevent this from happening. See http://cmev.wordpress.com/2008/05/09/cmev-bulletin-of-9th-may-2008-2200hrs-1st-release/
Anand Varghese
I have a question: now that the election is over, do we have any confirmed reports that cell phone networks were in fact blocked? Thanks.
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