Sri Lanka Muslim Congress Leader Rauff Hakeem said that the SLMC will not cause the government in the Eastern Provincial Council to fall despite the fact that the party has pledged its support to opposition candidate Maithripala Sirisena.

Speaking at the press conference yesterday to announce the decision of the party, Hakeem said that the SLMC was a key component in the EPC and it will not let the UPFA government to fall. The decision to support Sirisena was taken after considering national political situations, he said.

With the defection of the SLMC to the opposition, the UPFA government in the Eastern Provincial Council becomes a minority government.

It originally had 22 members out of 37 members in the council, including 14 UPFA members, 7 SLMC members and one National Freedom Front member. However with recent defections, the UPFA members in the government side decreased. With the defection of the SLMC, the UPFA has less than one third of the members in the EPC.