Sri Lanka announces first presidential vote since unrest

AFP| Colombo, Sri Lanka

The Daily Tribune - www.newsofbahrain.com

Sri Lanka's first presidential elections since an unprecedented economic crisis spurred widespread unrest will be held in September, the election commission said Friday.

The election will be the first test of the public mood since the height of the 2022 downturn, which caused months of food, fuel and medicine shortages across the island nation.

President Ranil Wickremesinghe, 75, who took office after street protests forced his predecessor to flee the country, has filed his nomination as an independent candidate.

He will face at least two rivals campaigning against austerity measures his government imposed to satisfy an International Monetary Fund bailout package.

"We expect a very competitive election," Rohana Hettiarachchi of local poll monitor PAFFEL told AFP. "The important issue is the economic crisis."

Election commission chair R.M.A.L. Rathnayake told reporters that the election had been scheduled for September 21, a Saturday, to ensure a high turnout.

Economic issues are expected to dominate the five-week campaign announced by the commission as the country emerges from its worst-ever recession in 2022, when the GDP shrank by a record 7.8 percent.

Inflation has since returned to normal levels from its peak of 70 percent at the height of the crisis.

Wickremesinghe has also successfully negotiated a restructuring of Sri Lanka's $46 billion foreign debt with bilateral lenders including China, following a 2022 government default.

"At this time we need the leadership of this capitalist to get us out of the mess," human rights activist Nimalka Fernando, 71, said of Wickremesinghe's record.

"We can talk about party politics after we have repaid our debts," she added.

- 'Pushed into poverty' -

But Wickremesinghe's policies to balance the government's books by hiking taxes and withdrawing generous utility subsidies have been deeply unpopular with the public.

While the months-long shortages seen at the peak of the crisis are now a distant memory, many Sri Lankans say his austerity measures have left them struggling to make ends meet.

"The main reason why you don't see queues for food and fuel now is because people can't afford them," opposition politician Eran Wickramaratne told AFP.

"More people have been pushed into poverty in the past two years."

Opposition parties have vowed to renegotiate terms of the $2.9 billion IMF bailout Wickremesinghe negotiated last year.

The president's main challenger so far is Sajith Premadasa, 57, a one-time party ally and current opposition leader.

Premadasa has vowed to continue with economic reforms and the IMF programme but pledged to cushion the public by reducing the tax increases Wickremesinghe imposed to shore up state revenue.

A leftist party is also fielding its leader, 55-year-old former agriculture minister Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who is campaigning against plans to privatise state companies.

- 'If it happens' -

Wickremesinghe took office following the government default in 2022, after a huge crowd stormed predecessor Gotabaya Rajapaksa's compound.

Rajapaksa, who was accused of steering Sri Lanka into the crisis through economic mismanagement, temporarily fled abroad and issued his resignation from Singapore.

More than 17 million Sri Lankans over the age of 18 are eligible to cast a ballot.

Local elections were due to be held last year but postponed indefinitely after the government insisted it had no money to conduct a nationwide vote.

"I don't know whether the election will be held," public servant Manoli Weerasinghe told AFP.

"Last year they gazetted the local government elections, but then postponed it saying the country had no money," she added. "Let's see if it happens."