On Sunday, the stage was set for over 1.5 crore Sri Lankan voters to elect their representatives to the 225-member Parliament. The country on Monday will witness its eighth general election in the last 37 years.
In tune with Sri Lanka’s electoral tradition, this time too, no single political formation is expected to win a majority. After the adoption of the 1978 Constitution providing for proportional representation, a party could muster a majority on its own only on two occasions. While the United National Party (UNP) secured 125 seats in the 1989 polls, its main rival, the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA), led by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), won 144 seats five years ago.
In this election, Ranil Wickremesinghe, UNP leader and Prime Minister, and Mahinda Rajapaksa, UPFA’s poll team leader and former president, are contesting from the electoral districts of Colombo (Western Province) and Kurunegala (North Western Province).
Notwithstanding the electoral tradition, the odds appear to be in favour of the UNP to form the next government. Apart from the forecast by various pre-poll surveys that the UNP is ahead of the UPFA, the parties such as the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) are inclined to back the UNP.
“We will support any arrangement that will endorse the mandate given to [Maithripala] Sirisena,” TNA leader R. Sampanthan told The Hindu on Sunday. In the presidential election held in January, Mr. Sirisena was the common opposition candidate who was backed by the UNP, TNA, JVP and a host of other parties.
M. Tilvin Silva, general secretary of the JVP, which is contesting in the parliamentary elections separately, said the UPFA would not get a majority.
He said his party would extend issue-based support to the UNP if it formed the government even though he would prefer to sit in the Opposition. “We will provide our support when it is required in the interest of the country and for the benefit of people,” he said.
Even though Mr Sirisena has, in his letter as the SLFP president to Mr. Rajapaksa, referred to the possibility of the UPFA getting a majority, Mr. Wickremesinghe said “the governing word for us is ‘if’, because we know it is not ‘when’.
He expressed the hope that the UNP would get a majority. All his allies such as the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC), Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) and a breakaway faction of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party led by Rajitha Senaratne are also contesting on the UNP’s symbol.
However, UPFA senior leader Dinesh Gunawardene expressed the hope that the Alliance would win hands down and the voters were not be disturbed over the exchange of correspondence between Mr. Sirisena and Mr. Rajapaksa and the former’s action against two leaders of the Alliance. “They would like to see Mr. Rajapaksa as the next Prime Minister,” he said.
