Ranil Wickremesinghe battles odds in Sri Lanka elections
Image credit X.com @RW_SRILANKA
Sri Lanka begins counting of votes in presidential election
By Manish Anand
New Delhi, September 21: Incumbent Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe is battling the odds in the national election. The counting of the votes has begun, and early trends are likely to emerge by midnight.
The presidential election in Sri Lanka has zeroed in on three candidates – Wickremesinghe, Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the National People’s Power (NPP) coalition and the opposition leader, Sajith Premadasa, from the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB).
The Colombo-based political pundits reckon that Wickremesinghe is running at third position. But they are sounding cautious in ruling out Wickremesinghe.
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The incumbent Sri Lankan president has been blessed, literally, with enormous chance opportunities in the past. He is the only internationally known politician of Sri Lanka.
Besides, Wickremesinghe rescued Sri Lanka from an economic disaster. In 2022, he was the lone MP in the Sri Lankan parliament when then president Gotabaya Rajapaksha ran away from the island nation.
It was to the credit of Wickremesinghe that he worked with India and the International Monetary Fund to bring back Sri Lanka from the state of a sovereign default to an economic stability.
The New Delhi-based media is running interviews of Wickremesinghe ahead of the verdict in the poll. He is asserting the stance that the mutuality with India is in the national interests of Sri Lanka.
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Namal Rajapaksa of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) is also trying his luck in the poll. He is the son of former president Mahinda Rajapaksa. He carries the legacy of the Rajapaksa clan in the Sri Lankan politics.
Dissanayake is a left-leaning politician. New Delhi-based observers are wary that he could swing Colombo back to pro-China stance. It was the China induced debt-trap that taken Colombo to the state of a sovereign default.
Yet, the peaceful election in Sri Lanka on Saturday is gaining accolades globally for the success of democracy in the island nation.
Himal Southasian, a digital magazine, described Dissanayake as a serious contender in the presidential election. It noted: “In the 2019 presidential election, Dissanayake secured only about three per cent of the vote while a year later he won just three seats in the 225-seat house”.
Watch Campaign Video of Ranil Wickremesinghe:
The poll performances earned mocking label of the “3-per cent party” for Dissanayake. But, Himal, stated that Dissanayake’s campaign steadily grew in strength over the past year.
Pamodi Waravita in The New York Times summed up the Opposition campaign, saying that Wickremesinghe has been targeted in the poll for “placing an unfair burden on the poor through increased taxation”. “They also say he is letting off the hook the elites whose corruption and mismanagement wrecked the economy,” Waravita further wrote.
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