COLOMBO: Mahinda Rajapaksa, who was appointed as Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister by President Maithripala Sirisena in a controversial move, resigned Saturday as two crucial Supreme Court decisions made the embattled former strongman’s efforts to cling to premiership untenable. The pro-Rajapaksa lawmaker, Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena, told reporters that Rajapaksa decided in a meeting Friday with President Maithripala Sirisena to resign to allow the president to appoint a new government. "Since I have no intention of remaining as prime minister without a general election being held, and in order to not hamper the president in any way, I will resign from the position of prime minister and make way for the president to form a new government," Mr Rajapaksa said in his resignation statement. A look at how Sri Lanka has plunged into a political crisis and what could happen next:

HOW IT CAME ABOUT

The conflict began when Sirisena sacked Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and appointed Rajapaksa, a former strongman president, in his place. Rajapaksa, who was president from 2005 to 2015, is considered a hero by some in Sri Lanka's ethnic Sinhalese majority because he oversaw the end of a 25-year civil war by crushing ethnic minority Tamil rebels in 2009. In response, Sirisena dissolved Parliament and ordered new elections, but those actions were put on hold by the Supreme Court until it heard the case and delivered its judgment Thursday. Sirisena has resisted suggestions that he reappoint Wickremesinghe, but may now be compelled to do so since Wickremesinghe has shown he has the support of 117 lawmakers, a majority of the 225-member Parliament.
Mahinda Rajapaksa resigns as prime minister, effectively ending the constitutional crisis.