Newly appointed Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and a number of SLFP Parliamentary today joined the Sri Lanka Podujana Party  (SLPP), relinquishing their SLFP membership. 

Informed sources said over 50 MPs of the SLFP would obtain membership with the SLPP over the weekend, plunging the SLFP into a fresh political crisis. 

Along with Rajapaksa, Janaka Bandara Tennakoon, one of the most senior members of the SLFP too joined the SLPP, indicating that even the SLFP will move away from Sirisena. 

"We will strive to create a broader coalition with many stakeholders under the leadership of Maithripala Sirisena and Mahinda Rajapaksa to face the upcoming General Election and come out victorious," MP Namal Rajapaksa tweeted yesterday, after obtaining membership with the SLPP. 

"However, it is now becoming increasingly clear that the SLPP will piggyback on former President Rajapaksa's popularity at the election and will reduce the SLFP to a political non-entity," a source familiar with the matter told Asian Mirror.