When we got out of the subway station at the intersection of 42nd and Broadway on a gloomy Sunday, there were a few people outside H&M. While some were holding posters of “Go Home Gota,” others were still crowdsourcing pens and posters to write their slogans. People muttered introductions quietly to those next to them.

In a few hours, a crowd of nearly a hundred stood on the iconic Times Square crossing and chants in Sinhala from “Go Home Gota,” “Give Us Back Our Money” to “Sri Lanka, To The People” raged through the plaza. For a country of a modest 22 million people, this protest on April 3 was stronger than what many in attendance were anticipating.

Sri Lanka is in the midst of a devastating economic crisis, where basic necessities such as milk powder, bread, rice have become luxuries. People stand in queues from 4.am. to buy petrol and experience daily power cuts lasting more than 13 hours.

There have been many silent protests in Sri Lanka but it is only since March 31, when a peaceful protest in Mirihana, a few kilometers from the residence of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, sparked a widespread community mobilization. The protest at Times Square was but one in solidarity with all the people resisting on home soil.

“We want to show solidarity with the people suffering in Sri Lanka. Some of us who are living here in the United States find it quite easy to overlook the suffering and hardships faced by people back home. I myself came out last Thursday from Sri Lanka having experience standing in lines both for cooking gas and oil,” explained Thikshan, on the need to protest in solidarity across the world.

Photo Courtesy of Githmi Rabel and Huma Umar.

As we asked protesters to comment on the conditions in Sri Lanka and why they came out today, many of the people asked us to remove their last names from the piece for some degree of anonymity to escape the potential threat posed by the Rajapaksa security apparatus. In this article, people have only been quoted with their first names.

Keshia, another protester at Times Square, highlighted: “He tried to disappear two journalists for starting a Facebook group … and the only reason why they didn't let him was because of social media and people brought hundreds of lawyers and parked outside the Mirihana police station and made sure that he came out alive.” This was in reference to a “Go Home Gota” Facebook group that was made by a youth activist in Sri Lanka.

Having begun mainly in response to the economic crisis, the demands of protestors were at first concentrated on economic reform, emphasizing the pressing need to get rid of the corruption and bureaucratic inertia which led to economic mismanagement.

Photo Courtesy of Githmi Rabel and Huma Umar.

“Something needs to be done because our families in Sri Lanka are in desperate situations, you know, people are running out of medication. And a lot of people don't even have jobs because the factories are closing, the government offices are shifting … we should not have been living so close to the end, so we should have had cash,” argued Shalini, also from Sri Lanka. “So you can blame the Chinese … You can blame the war on Ukraine, but ultimately it's corruption and mismanagement that's caused this problem,” added Anjali, standing closeby. But the protests in Sri Lanka have also morphed into a greater indictment of the limitations of the current democratic structure, with slogans such as “Abolish the Executive Presidency”, “Repeal the 19A” and “Where are the missing persons?” becoming rallying calls from the public.

As Keshia shared: “I don't think corruption is the only thing I'm pissed about. I think Gotabaya announced his presidency three days after the Easter bombing attack and benefited greatly from anti-minority sentiment … And I think this is, yes, this is an economic crisis, but it started off as a humanitarian one, and those two things are linked. Those are not separate things. He's been stealing land from the North for years. He's been stealing land from Slave Island and Colombo for development projects.”

The emphasis was put on being aware of the human rights violations and war crimes committed by the Rajapaksa family who is responsible for much of the persecution of and hate crimes committed against the Tamil and Muslim minorities and hate-mongering along communal lines in recent years. The complicity of the Sinhalese-Buddhist majority, which voted this government into power was also emphasized.

Photo Courtesy of Githmi Rabel and Huma Umar.

“If we continue to vote for people that only care about rich Sinhalese people, we will just keep circling back to this moment … Sri Lanka has minorities, has always had minorities and we have to keep coming back to that. And that's what that's what I'm here for,” Keshia asserted.

The protest which took place at Times Square is an extension of the protests taking place in Sri Lanka and is a striking example of the intensity and reach of community mobilization present in Sri Lanka today, one which seemingly transcends the very ethnic and religious divides the current President capitalized upon to be voted into power.

“I want all of them gone. I don't want just Gota to be gone. I want his sons out, his cousins, his nieces and nephews. I want the money back. I want them convicted of crimes. I want them banned from having NRFCs. I want them banned from voting. Like I want all of the cascading effects to come down,” concluded Keshia.