SJB accuses President of plotting to postpone polls

The SJB says that President Ranil Wickremesinghe is planning to postpone elections.

Addressing the SJB’s Ududumbara Asana Balamandalaya meeting, yesterday, Chief Opposition Whip and Kandy District MP Lakshman Kiriella said that his party had decided to go before the courts against the President’s plans to postpone elections.

Kiriella said that elections to the local government bodies were due to be held in March next year. “So the President is trying to find an excuse for postponing them. He knows well that if an election is held, the UNP will definitely lose and it will not be able to save at least its deposits. The SLPP, too, would not be able to win. Only the SJB has a clear chance to win. That is why the President is trying to invent an excuse,” Kiriella said.

Kiriella added that the President had stated that the electoral system should be changed. “It is the incumbent President himself who brought the prevailing electoral system. It was on his watch the system was changed. It was while he was the Prime Minister the number of members in the councils was doubled and the quota for female members increased. Now, all of a sudden he says the system has to be changed. He says that the number of local council members needs to be reduced by 50 percent. He is getting ready to postpone the local government polls on the pretext of reforming the electoral system,” Kiriella said.