33 Facts About Namal Rajapaksa

Lakshman Namal Rajapaksa is a Sri Lankan lawyer and politician.

Namal Rajapaksa is the eldest son of former President and former Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa and a member of parliament.

Namal Rajapaksa was the Minister of Youth and Sports from 2020 to 2022.

Namal Rajapaksa is the son of Mahinda Rajapaksa and Shiranthi.

Namal Rajapaksa's paternal grandfather Don Alwin Rajapaksa was a member of parliament and Minister of Agriculture and Land in Wijeyananda Dahanayake's government.

Namal Rajapaksa then went to City University London from where he graduated in September 2006 with a third-class degree law degree.

Namal Rajapaksa sat for the college's preliminary exam in October 2009 and passed with second-class honours.

In December 2010, several media sources reported that Namal Rajapaksa had allegedly received preferential treatment during his final examination at Sri Lanka Law College.

Namal Rajapaksa was sworn in as an attorney at law on 15 December 2011 in front of a panel of Supreme Court judges including Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake.

Namal Rajapaksa first played for the school's senior team in 2002 and captained the 1st XV team in 2005.

Namal Rajapaksa led the Sri Lanka under 19 team in 2004.

Namal Rajapaksa played for City University London from 2006 to 2009.

In 2010, Namal Rajapaksa was invited to play for the Sri Lanka national rugby union team and in 2013 was appointed the team's captain, a position he retained until he retired from competitive rugby in July 2014.

Namal Rajapaksa contested the 2010 parliamentary election as one of the United People's Freedom Alliance's candidates in the Hambantota District and was elected to Parliament.

Namal Rajapaksa's father had been an MP for the Hambantota District for 16 years before he was elected president in 2005.

Many believed that Namal Rajapaksa was being groomed to succeed his father as president.

Namal Rajapaksa was often seen at state events and was chief guest at several ceremonies inaugurating new roads, bridges, schools and other government buildings.

In January 2011, Namal Rajapaksa led a parliamentary delegation to Libya and met with Muammar Gaddafi.

Namal Rajapaksa made official trips to the United Nations Headquarters, Nepal, Palestine, Japan, South Korea, the United States, China and Australia.

Namal Rajapaksa led Hambantota's unsuccessful bid to host the 2018 Commonwealth Games.

Namal Rajapaksa was a key figure of his father's unsuccessful 2015 presidential campaign.

Namal Rajapaksa was accused by many for his father's downfall and the misuse of public funds.

Namal Rajapaksa was re-elected to Parliament in 2015 and 2020.

Namal Rajapaksa was appointed as the National Organizer of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna on 27 March 2024.

Namal Rajapaksa didn't run for re-election from Hambanthota in 2024, marking the first time in 88 years a member of his family didn't contest from the ancestral electoral district.

Namal Rajapaksa was accused of being involved in the death of Wasim Thajudeen, a Sri Lankan rugby union player who played for Havelock Sports Club and the national team.

Sri Lanka's new government in 2015 has slapped a one-time tax of LKR 1 billion on the only sports television channel in the country, which is part-owned by Namal Rajapaksa, saying that the sports channel has not paid a single penny to the government, since its inception.

The Rajapaksa government headed by Namal's father had transferred the sports broadcast rights to CSN by a cabinet decision with no open tender or any known competitive bidding process.

Namal Rajapaksa is being investigated for money laundering after a civil group named Voice Against Corruption lodged a complaint against him to the FCID.

Namal Rajapaksa was released from the airline at the request of the then Secretary to the President Lalith Weeratunga to handle Namal Rajapaksa's "special projects" but continued to receive her basic salary as well as a "productivity allowance" in addition to other perks and promotions.

Namal Rajapaksa was arrested by the Financial Criminal Investigations Department on July 11,2016, on charges of money-laundering.

Namal Rajapaksa was arrested on 10 October 2017 by the Hambantota Police with two other MP's for charges of unlawful assembly, causing damage to public property, injuring police officers, obstructing their duty and violating a court order.

Namal Rajapaksa married Limini Weerasinghe on 12 September 2019 at Gangaramaya Temple.