COLOMBO: World Cup winning Sri Lankan Cricket hero Arjuna Ranatunga has been nominated the country’s ports and shipping minister following one of the most dramatic election victories in the country’s history.
Mr Ranatunga said he had “a big responsibility to clean up this place”, referring to the ministry which had been rumoured to be subject to bribes and corruption. “My priority is to fight corruption and also to make sure that corrupt politicians are not accommodated on our side,” he added.
Against all predictions, Maithripala Sirisena won the recent elections in the country, defeating incumbent president Mahinda Rajapaksa on an anti-corruption pledge, and naming his cabinet on the same basis.
Mr Ranatunga was selected as captain of the Sri Lankan cricket team in 1989 and led it to its greatest triumph, when it won the one-day World Cup in 1996.
