One Post, Two Realities: Mahinda Rajapaksa's Facebook post, and a polarised public in Sri Lanka

Описание: Social media discourse on former president Mahinda Rajapaksa (MR) reveals significant divides in Sri Lanka’s social, and political landscapes. This report considers 3,079 comments responding to MR’s post on Facebook about vacating his official residence in Colombo.

Supporters construct an elaborate mythological framework that transforms MR from a former political leader into a quasi-monarchical or even mythical figure, employing royal epithets, religious invocations, and familial terms that fundamentally recast, and essentially undermine the democratic relationship between citizen, and elected representatives. Critics present counter-narratives that frame MR as the chief architect of economic catastrophe, and systemic corruption, using mockery, and derision to dismantle his claims to dignity, and statesmanship. These opposing constructions reveal how political identity’s contested constructions in contemporary social media landscapes operates through mutually exclusive interpretative frameworks that share little to no common ground for dialogue or persuasion.

A decade after his departure from executive power, and especially after 2022’s aragalaya, MR’s Facebook post triggers responses that demonstrate how the civil war’s conclusion in May 2009 remains the foundational political event through which subsequent developments are interpreted. The war victory functions as an ideological prism for MR’s supporters, rendering any, and all criticism as ingratitude towards a national saviour, whilst opponents attempt to reframe this achievement as irrelevant when measured against economic devastation, and kleptocracy. This fluid dynamic illustrates how historical events are actively instrumentalised in contemporary political discourse (on social media), with each faction wielding selective memory to legitimise their current positions, and presentations of authenticity.

Video generated by Google NotebookLM. Full report available at https://sanjanah.wordpress.com/2025/0...