Monday 5th May, 2025

The Election Commission (EC) has said that everything is ready for tomorrow’s local government (LG) polls. However, a trade union representing the Grama Niladharis (GNs), who play a crucial role in conducting elections, has complained that funds allocated for hiring generators to ensure an emergency power supply to counting centres, etc., are inadequate, and therefore those places may be left without back-up power systems tomorrow.

The GNs should not be held responsible if anything untoward happens in case of blackouts either due to technical defects or sabotage tomorrow, President of the United Grama Niladharis’ Association, Nanadana Ranasinghe, is reported to have said, demanding an explanation from the authorities concerned as to how such an emergency will be handled. He has asked whether they will use emergency lamps, candles or pandam (flambeaux) in the event of a power failure.

It is hoped that the government will not launch a witch-hunt against the GNs, and that the EC, etc., will act swiftly to solve the aforesaid problem. Nothing is so certain as power failures in this country, which experienced a countrywide power outage about three months ago.

We have witnessed numerous instances where governments led by the UNP and the SLFP resorted to barbaric violence and large-scale vote rigging to win elections; presidential polls in 1982 and 1988, under President J. R. Jayewardene’s watch, the 1989 parliamentary election under R. Premadasa’s presidency, and the 1999 North-Western Provincial Council election during President Chandrika Bandaranaike’s tenure stand out among them. The JVP has a history of trying to sabotage elections by unleashing mindless terror. In fact, it was the JVP’s terror campaign that enabled the then ruling UNP to stuff ballot boxes and win elections in 1988 and 1989.

Given Sri Lankan politicians’ tendency to manipulate elections, the possibility of governments resorting to electoral frauds to retain their hold on power in the future cannot be ruled out. Hence the pressing need for the EC to ensure that nothing is left to chance in its efforts to ensure free and fair elections.

One may recall that a power failure helped the UNP win a fiercely contested election in the early 1980s. President Jayewardene scrapped a general election which was due in 1982, for fear of losing his five-sixths majority in Parliament; he held a heavily-rigged referendum instead, undertaking to hold by-elections in the electorates where his government would lose. He had to hold 18 such by-elections in 1983; four of them were won by the Opposition in spite of large-scale rigging and violence unleashed by the UNP. Dinesh Gunawardena, Anil Moonesinghe, Richard Pathirana and Amarasiri Dodangoda won the Maharagama, Matugama, Akmeemana and Baddegama electorates, respectively. Violence and rigging enabled the UNP to win the other electorates, especially Mahara.

In Mahara, at the conclusion of the first round of counting, it became clear that SLFP candidate Vijaya Kumaratunga had won, but the UNP insisted on recounts, and then there occurred a blackout. When power was restored, UNP candidate Kamalawarna Jayakody had beaten Kumaratunga! The Opposition counting agents claimed that some election officials loyal to the UNP had literally swallowed dozens of votes polled by Vijaya, who had survived an attempt by the UNP to kill him in the run-up to the election.

Sri Lanka is no stranger to election malpractices although it has been free from them for some time. Anything is possible in high-stakes elections. It may be recalled that in 2020, the then US President Donald Trump claimed that his rivals had stolen America’s presidential election and engineered his defeat. So, a country like Sri Lanka has to take all possible precautions to ensure free and fair elections. Reliable back-up power systems must be available at all counting centres tomorrow.

History has a remarkable ability to repeat itself even after prolonged lapses; therein lies the rub. In a democracy, the integrity of elections must not be taken for granted. Constant vigilance is said to be the price of freedom.

It is said that in times war laws fall silent. In Sri Lanka, this much-quoted Ciceronian aphorism seems to hold true even in peacetime when politicians in power, their family members and supporters happen to be on the wrong side of the law.

It was widely thought that last year’s regime change would bring about a radical change, and that unlike during past governments, the law would apply equally to everyone, but traffic laws apparently fell silent on the Southern Expressway on Thursday (01).

Some viral videos doing the rounds in the digital space show a large number of private buses transporting people to the NPP May Day rally in Colombo, unlawfully parked on the Southern Expressway, with the government supporters having lunch or strolling on a paved shoulder of the road.

It is a punishable offence for vehicles to stop in undesignated sections of expressways in non-emergency situations. Instances have been reported where people were fined or even prosecuted for doing so. The aforementioned videos show a highway patrol vehicle among the unlawfully parked buses, with the police personnel looking the other way. The culture of impunity seems to persist. No legal action had been taken against the errant drivers at the time of going to press. The police would have promptly ticketed them if they had been transporting Opposition supporters to a political rally. So much for the incumbent government’s pledge to restore the rule of law!

Some NPP politicians have sought to deny that the individuals seen in the videos are their supporters; if so, they should have the incident probed urgently. The registration numbers of the buses are clearly visible in the videos, or the vehicles and their drivers can be easily identified with the help of traffic camera footage. It is not difficult for the police to trace the errant drivers and passengers and take legal action against them if they care to do so.

Ordinary motorists who happen to violate traffic laws on an expressway invariably face heavy fines. The police must be made to explain why they did not take prompt action against the drivers of the buses and the political activists for the transgression at issue.

One of the main election promises of the ruling NPP was to ensure that everybody would be equal before the law in keeping with the cherished legal maxim—nemo est supra leges or no one is above the law. The NPP leaders, during their Opposition days, would flay their predecessors for violating traffic laws, among other things. They would condemn the VIP convoy security procedures, claiming that such measures worsened traffic congestion in urban areas and caused much inconvenience to the public. They promised a system change. But the status quo remains to all intents and purposes. The aforesaid video footage in circulation exemplifies a famous Orwellian paradox; are we to conclude that under the new dispensation all people are equal, but some people are ‘more equal’ than others?

Meanwhile, one may recall that the JVP leaders vehemently opposed the construction of the Southern Expressway, claiming that it was being built to transport malu ambulthiyal or the traditional ‘sour fish curry’ to the then ruling family all the way from Tangalle! Today, some NPP supporters stand accused of having eaten rice perhaps with malu ambulthiyal on the Southern Expressway in violation of traffic laws!

Unless stern action is taken against the bus drivers and the political activists who violated traffic laws on the Southern Expressway, others are likely to follow suit, making the highways as chaotic as other roads, some of which are partially closed for New Year festivals and bicycle races to be held much to the inconvenience of the public.

It will be interesting to see if the NPP government will practise what it preached to its predecessors about the rule of law, and direct the police to probe the expressway incident, which has tarnished its image, and taken the gloss off its successful May Day rally to some extent.

Saturday 3rd May, 2025

The JVP-led NPP government is quite upbeat about its massive May Day rally, which was intended to give a mega boost to its local government election campaign. Governments in power usually hold mammoth rallies to demonstrate their power. They are capable of doing so as they have the entire state machinery at their disposal and are never short of funds, which flow from various sources.

They hire thousands of buses and bring their supporters from all parts of the country to their rallies, especially the ones on May Day, the way the JVP/NPP did on Thursday. Political parties also bus hired attendees to their events, as is public knowledge. This is the name of the game in Sri Lankan politics.

Huge crowds at political rallies can be thought to reflect a surge in popular support, if at all, only when they are held by Opposition parties, like the show of strength put on by the SLPP at Galle Face in 2017, one year after its formation, during the Yahapalana government. The JVP, which was supporting the UNP-led Yahapalana administration at that time, claimed that the SLPP had bused its supporters as well as crowd fillers to Galle Face Green in their thousands.

It may be recalled that President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s election rallies were much bigger than those of his rival, Maithripala Sirisena, in the run-up to the 2015 presidential polls, but he suffered an ignominious defeat. Sirisena came from behind to beat Rajapaksa in the race. The JVP posted an interesting cartoon on social media to belittle the crowd sizes at Rajapaksa’s election rallies, claiming that the UPFA transported people from Mahinda’s home district, Hambantota, to his meetings across the country.

In the first panel of that cartoon, while addressing a rally at Ruwanwella, President Rajapaksa asks what the people in that area need most, and someone in the audience shouts, “A fisheries harbour”; the next panel of the cartoon shows a visibly embarrassed Mahinda grimace with a think bubble above his head reading: “Darn it! They have brought these idiots from Tangalle, again!” (To the uninitiated, Ruwanwella is a landlocked electorate while Tangalle is a coastal township.)

The UNP held a series of well-attended political events following President Sirisena’s abortive attempt to sack its government in October 2018, but it was reduced to a single National List slot in the 2020 general election.

It seems that in this country, huge parliamentary majorities are jinxed. All previous governments that secured two-thirds majorities became hugely unpopular and could not win second terms, the only exception being the J. R. Jayawardene regime which resorted to election malpractices and political violence to retain its hold on power. The SLFP-led United Front government, elected in 1970 with a two-thirds majority, lost the 1977 general election, where the UNP obtained a five-sixths majority.

The SLFP-led UPFA, which won a two-thirds majority, under Mahinda Rajapaksa’s presidency in 2010, collapsed in 2015 owing to mass crossovers. The SLPP obtained a two-thirds majority in 2020, but its Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa had to resign, and President Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled the country and resigned amidst a popular uprising in 2022.

The JVP-led NPP government also has a two-thirds majority in Parliament, but it has had to campaign extremely hard in a bid to win the upcoming local government elections. It should have been in a position to defeat the twice-beaten Opposition hands down. Whether it will be able to score an impressive win again on 06 May remains to be seen.

The only way the NPP government can retain its popularity is to live up to people’s expectations and refrain from compromising on its policies and principles, which it marketed to the electorate to win elections. Having talked the talk, it now has to walk the walk. More talking will not do.