A history of Sri Lankan Presidential Elections
This is the first in a series of reportage notes on contemporary Sri Lankan politics. This note was first published on 3 June 2024. This note contains photographic images of graphic violence. No substantive corrections other than for clarity, style, or grammar have been made since its original publication.
Current President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s term expires by 18 November 2024. The constitution requires that the election for the next President be held “not less than one month and not more than two months before the expiration of the term of the President in office”, being between 18 September and 18 October 2024.
If the sitting President is eligible for a second term and wants to re-run, they can call an election after four years into their five year term. However, this option is not available for Presidents who are elected to complete the term of a resigned, dead, or impeached President.
Background
Presidential Elections have always been fought between two clear candidates from Sri Lanka’s two major parties or their coalative iterations — United National Party (UNP) and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). For the first time, this is not presumptive.
Roots
The country was not always an Executive Presidency. The office was created by UNP’s Prime Minister Junius Richard ‘JR’ Jayawardene in 1978 through a constitutional overhaul. He became the first Executive President through the transition.
Sri Lanka was slowly recovering from a economic crisis and recession. Brought on by a closed-market centrally-planned economy under the SLFP-coalesced United Front (UF) government, the crisis led to food shortages and rationing. Jayawardene introduced some market reforms, mostly by opening up imports.
Meanwhile, in the north and east, the early stages of the civil war were brewing. Sporadic anti-Tamil violence, marked by events such as the anti-Tamil riots and the government-backed burning of the Jaffna library, contributed to the North’s distrust of the UNP and Colombo as a whole.
1982 Election (reelects Junius Richard Jayewardene — JR2)
The first Presidential Election was held on 19 December 1982. Incumbent Jayewardene’s main challenger was SLFP’s former Agriculture Minister Hector Kobbekaduwa.
Election results reflected the regionally-divided politics — urban Sinhala areas mostly went to the UNP, but North/East and rural went mostly to the SLFP. Jayawardena won by securing 3,450,811 (52.91%) of the total 6,602,617 votes cast. Kobbekaduwa got 2,548,438 (39.07%).
Continued conflicts
The hard-left/Sinhala Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) after a failed insurrection in 1971, attempted another in 1987, unleashing heavy violence against both the State and anyone connected to the State — including family members of servicemen. The government’s response was also violent. Thousands were killed, almost exclusively extra-judicially, in retaliatory action both through the police and military, and proxies.
The seperatist war in the North came to a break with an India-backed peace negotiation, and constitutional amendment that federalised some powers to the provinces. But the the Indian Peace Keeping Forces (IPKF) who were stationed in the North carried out its own wave of violence against civilians. JVP and Sinhala nationalists saw India’s presence in Sri Lanka as colonialism.
1988 Election — (elects Ranasinghe Premadasa)
President Jayawardena completed two terms (first, transitory; second, elected). His Prime Minister Ranasinghe Premadasa was the UNP’s nominee to hold office next. The SLFP was represented by former Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike.
JVP and its proxies demanded people abstain from voting, threatening them with death otherwise. Government’s proxies demanded people vote, threatening them with death otherwise. Areas in the North and East of the country under control by the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were not polled. The resulting turnout was one of the lowest in Sri Lanka’s history — 55.32%
Premadasa beat Bandaranaike to succeed Jayawardene, securing 2,569,199 (50.43%) against Bandaranaike’s 2,289,860 (44.94%) at the 19 December 1988 poll.
1993 Election (elects Dingiri Banda Wijetunga, DBW)
An LTTE suicide bomber killing President Premadasa during a UNP May Day rally in 1993 triggered the line of succession in Sri Lanka for the first time. Prime Minister Dingiri Banda ‘DB’ Wijetunga succeeded as the Acting President, and was unanimously elected by Parliament a week later on 7 May to serve out the remainder of Premadasa’s term till 1994.
Self-exiled Chandrika Kumaratunga, (nee Bandaranaike) the daughter of former Prime Ministers Sirimavo and Solomon ‘SWRD’ Bandaranaike, was courted by the SLFP as their future face. She was also the widow of a popular Sinhala actor and politician Vijaya Kumaratunga, who had been killed by the JVP’s militant proxy Deshapremi Janatha Vyaparaya (DJV) in 1988.
Nearly two decades of violent rule by the UNP had made the party deeply unpopular. Remnants of insurrection-era proxies, including personal hit squads of several Cabinet Ministers and the President himself, remained.
The SLFP created the People Alliance (PA), a coalition whose main rallying call was accountability for extra-judicial killings. To protect their young charismatic candidate, SLFP-backed politicians employed their own illegally-armed groups.
The SLFP defeated the UNP in the 1994 Parliament Elections, but failed to secure a majority in the 225-member parliament.
The PA managed to piece together a government with the support of leftist parties, and President Wijetunga appointed Kumaratunge as Prime Minister ceding effective power to her. This marks the only window in which an Executive President willingly rendered themselves into a nominal role.
1994 Election (elects Chandrika Bandaranaike-Kumaratunge, CBK1)
Kumaratunga contested the Presidency under the PA and was challenged by former Leader of the Opposition Gamini Dissanayake of the UNP. A suicide bomber attacked a UNP election rally in Colombo, killing most of the party’s leadership including Dissanayake. The UNP then fielded Dissanayake’s widow, Srima Dissanayake, partially hoping to gain sympathy votes.
Kumaratunge swept the poll held on 9 November 1994 securing 62.28% (4,709,205) of the votes: the highest percentage any Sri Lankan Presidential candidate has won to date.
The JVP, which had by now attempted two insurrections and failed at both, entered national-level electoral politics for the first time under the name Sri Lanka Progressive Front (SLPF). Its candidate Nihal Galappatti came in fifth, with 22,749 (0.3%) votes. Widowed Dissanayake only secured 35.91% with 2,715,283 votes. Like with the 1988 Presidential Election, areas under the control of the LTTE in the North and East of the country were either not polled or had low turnout.
Overall country-wide turnout returned to 70%+, Sri Lanka’s usual.
The first stages of her presidency saw attempts at devolution of power to the provinces and accountability, but very little materialised (hindered mostly due to the UNP’s opposition). In the face of dwindling popularity, Kumaratunge called for early elections five years into her six-year term. Leader of the Opposition Ranil Wickremesinghe was the main challenger. Elections were scheduled for 21 December 1999.
Three days prior to the election, on 18 December, a failed suicide attack (allegedly by the LTTE) seriously injured Kumaratunge at her final rally in Colombo. She lost her right eye.
1999 Election (reelects Chandrika Bandaranaike-Kumaratunge, CBK2)
She went to win the election with 4,312,157 votes (51.12%) against Wickremasinghe's 3,602,748 (42.71%), losing almost a fifth of her support base from the previous election. Parts of the North and East under the LTTE’s control were either not polled, or had single-digit turnout rates. The JVP entered Nandana Gunathilake as its candidate (under their own banner for the first time) securing 344,173 (4.08%) of the vote.
An on-schedule Parliamentary Election in 2000 which was followed by two snap elections in 2001 and 2004 resulted in Kumaratunge initially gaining, losing, and then again gaining control of parliament. UNP’s Wickremesinghe carried out a short stint as Prime Minister in an extremely uncomfortable cohabitation government with Bandaranaike as President, negotiating the beginnings of a peace deal with the LTTE.
The LTTE used the window of relative peace to carry out targeted attacks against major rivals, regroup and rearm, and to strengthen their de facto state’s infrastructure. The peace process however was deeply unpopular in the Sinhalese-majority south. Heavy clashes between the LTTE and a breakaway faction, assassination of key intelligence sources and officers, and attacks on civilians all drove the public to lose faith in the peace process.
Sri Lanka’s tourism-dependent economy went into recession in 2001 when the LTTE attacked the Colombo Airport, heavily damaging the national carrier.
Kumaratunge appointed her former Fisheries Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa as the Prime Minister after the 2004 polls. Despite being embroiled in a major financial scandal embezzling tsunami aid, he was popular in the Sinhala-Buddhist south due to his nationalistic rhetoric and charismatic persona.
Kumaratunge attempted to hold onto the Presidency till 2006, claiming that her term began in 2000 (six years after her first election) instead of 1999 when she was reelected. Supreme Court struck down her claim and elections were scheduled for 17 November 2005.
Wickremesinghe had become deeply unpopular among Sinhala constituents. Buddhist-nationalism was peaking following the death of a charismatic monk Gangodawila Soma. LTTE’s assassination of Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar added to public’s sentiments about the failures of the peace process. Rajapaksa capitalised on nationalist sentiments and went into a coalition with the JVP, forming the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) to contest the Presidency.
2005 Election (elects Percy Mahendra ‘Mahinda’ Rajapaksa — MR 1.0)
The LTTE, supposedly in partnership with the Rajapaksa campaign, threatened to dismember any voters who went to polling booths in areas under their direct and indirect control. The result was extremely low turnout in the North and East. Supposed interlocutor Tiran Alles (later Cabinet Minister of Law and Order) claimed that the Rajapaksa campaign feared Wickremesinghe performing strong in the conflict areas.
Rajapaksa won the election on a razor-thin margin with 4,887,152 votes (50.29%) against Wickremesinghe’s 4,706,366 (48.43%). This remains Sri Lanka’s closest presidential race to date.
The peace process came to an end by 2006, and the last stage of Sri Lanka’s civil war with the separatist LTTE started. Their increasing attacks on civilian targets brought about public backing for the government’s operations. Failed suicide attempts made it personal (Secretary to the Ministry of Defence and future President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was uninjured in one; Army Commander Lt Gen Sarath Fonseka was critically injured in another) for top military leadership.
In May 2009 the war came to an end with the killing of LTTE’s leader Velupillai Prabhakaran by Sri Lanka Army.
2010 Election (reelects Percy Mahendra Rajapaksa — MR 2.0)
Rajapaksa capitalised on the popularity boost from ending the war and called for early elections to be held in January 2010. His main competitor was Gen Sarath Fonseka (Sri Lanka’s first serving four-star) who under President Rajapaksa had commanded the Army mere months before. The duo fell out after Rajapaksa trimmed Fonseka’s command powers fearing political rivalry.
Fonseka was backed by a coalition comprising of the UNP, JVP, Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC), All Ceylon Makkal Congress (ACMC), and the previously pro-LTTE Tamil National Alliance (TNA/ITAK).
Rajapaksa comfortably won the election with 6,015,934 votes (57.88%) with Fonseka almost a third behind him at 4,173,185 (40.15%). An emboldened Rajapaksa then had Fonseka arrested, court martialled, stripped of his rank, and imprisoned on corruption charges.
Rajapaksa quickly concentrated power following his election for the second term — brother Gotabaya continued as Secretary to the Ministry of Defence, brother Basil became Cabinet Minister for Economic Development, and brother Chamal became Speaker of Parliament. President Rajapaksa amended the constitution removing term limits and introduced financial-centralisation laws, sacking an opposing Chief Justice in the process. Eldest son Namal became de facto Sports and Youth Minister, second son Yoshitha became a Naval Officer, and youngest son Rohitha became a rocket scientist. Nephew Shasheendra became Chief Minister of the Uva Province. Another nephew Malaka was already a special forces sailor. Friends and cousins dotted the Cabinet, senior posts at State-owned Enterprises, and diplomatic missions overseas.
The rampant corruption, resultant cost of living, and attempted repression made the Rajapaksas unpopular. Calculating that later elections would harm his chances, President Rajapaksa declared a poll asking for a third term.
2015 Election (elects Maithripala Sirisena — MS)
The opposition was mostly in disarray. However, like in 2010, a coalition of anti-Rajapaksa sentiment brought together the UNP, JVP, Muslim minority parties, Tamil minority parties, and a portion from the Rajapaksa camp. His own Health Minister Maithripala Sirisena defected to become the main challenger.
The poll took place on 8 January 2015 at a record high (at the time) turnout of 81.52%. Sirisena won the election with 51.28% (6,217,162) to Rajapaksa’s 47.58% (5,768,090).
Opposition Leader, UNP’s Ranil Wickremesinghe, initially formed a minority government, and subsequent to Parliamentary Elections later in 2015 went into a coalition with Sirisena’s wing of the UPFA. The constitution was amended to bring back presidential term limits, trim some presidential powers, and establish independent institutions as checks and balances. Right to information was codified as a fundamental right, backed by some of the world’s strongest data archival and dissemination laws. Fonseka was reinstated and promoted to a Field Marshal (Sri Lanka’s only five-star military, and South Asia’s fourth).
Sirisena and Wickremesinghe eventually fell out, culminating with Sirisena unconstitutionally sacking Wickremesinghe, only to replace him with former President Rajapaksa as the Prime Minister on 26 October 2018.
Wickremesinghe challenged the President to a Parliamentary vote of confidence. Facing an imminent political defeat, Sirisena in the course of several weeks first prorogued, and then attempted to dissolve parliament. Courts struck down Sirisena’s actions and he was forced to reinstate Wickremesinghe.
Wickremesinghe was again on a path to being deeply unpopular. An insider-dealing scandal involving his personal pick for the Central Bank Governor (who since disappeared) seriously damaged his credibility. A series of coordinated suicide attacks in Easter Sunday of 2019 by religious fundamentalists brought to question post-war accountability efforts and law and order credentials.
Mere days after the series of suicide bombs, former Secretary to the Ministry of Defence Gotabaya Rajapaksa announced that he will be seeking the Presidency later that year, with pledges for an authoritarian meritocratic administration that will deliver on national security and economic development.
2019 Election (elects Gotabaya Rajapaksa — GR)
Prior to the election a majority of the UNP split from Wickremesinghe, forming the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) with Sajith Premadasa, son of killed president Ranasinghe Premadasa, as its leader. Rajapaksa and Premadasa faced off at the Presidential Election held on 17 November 2019.
Gotabaya Rajapaksa won the election at a new record-high turnout of 83.72%. Premadasa’s 5,564,239 (41.99%) votes were easily beaten by Rajapaksa’s 6,924,255 (52.25%). Rajapaksa appointed his brother, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, as the Prime Minister.
Delayed Parliamentary elections in 2020 were swept by Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP). With support of several defectors, some checks and balances on the Presidency were removed and the constitution amended to allow their dual-citizen brother Basil Rajapaksa to re-enter parliament.
The economy which initially took a beating through dropped tourism numbers after the constitutional crisis, had taken a bigger hit from the Easter Attacks. By the time the Covid-19 pandemic hit, Sri Lanka was struggling. A heavily militarised yet mostly-failed pandemic response from the government started contributing towards public discontent.
Then a series of economic decisions, primary among which being a refusal for a managed sovereign default, triggered an economic crisis. Initial protests about fuel shortages and brownouts quickly turned into calls for resignations. A Rajapaksa-backed violent attempt using police and proxies to clear protestors from Colombo’s protest areas pushed the movement to a tipping point and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa was forced to resign (after hiding out in his official residence). President Gotabaya appointed Ranil Wickremesinghe, whose UNP by this point had been reduced to a single seat in parliament, as Prime Minister.
Despite appeasement efforts, Gotabaya Rajapaksa was also forced to resign — a first in Sri Lanka’s history. Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe succeeded to the office of Acting President.
2022 Election (elects Ranil Wickremesinghe — RW)
On 20 July 2022, Parliament voted at a three-candidate election for the President. Leader of the Opposition Sajith Premadasa had initially announced his candidacy, but retracted on the day of the poll.
Wickremesinghe won the election with 134 votes to 82, facing off Premadasa-backed former Rajapaksa-ally Dullas Alahapperuma. Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the National People’s Power (NPP) — a coalition formed for the 2020 Parliamentary Election around the Leninist-Marxist JVP — got three votes.
The Wickremesinghe Presidency
Wickremesinghe is deeply unpopular and is widely viewed as an extension of the Rajapaksa administration — by both Rajapaksa proponents and opponents, garnering him the moniker “Ranil Rajapaksa.” Failure to hold Rajapaksa-era officials responsible for the economic crisis to account has further depleted his credibility. Sixteen out of his 19-member cabinet are Ministers from the pre-crisis cabinet, reshuffled.
So far, two serious candidates have emerged vying for the Presidency. Anura Kumara Dissanayake from the NPP, and Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa of the SJB.
Two others are also in the running. Dilith Jayaweera is a Sinhala-nationalist media mogul who was a financier and ideologue behind the Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s presidency. Dhammika Perera, a businessman with interests in hospitality, finance, and gaming (who made record profits under a Gotabaya Rajapaksa era sanitary-ware import ban). Neither has serious chances of electoral success.
A year ago, President Ranil Wickremesinghe was the presumptive Rajapaksa-backed candidate. But neither his candidacy nor Rajapaksas support — if any — have materialised. His backers have floated the unfeasible idea of amending the constitution to extend his term — amendments that would need to be passed through a national referendum, in addition to 2/3 majority in parliament.
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