Good news for Sri Lankan leftist politician Anura Kumara Dissanayake: He is leading the presidential election according to the latest data. This is the election, which took place on Saturday, as the first one after the 2022 protest demanding the resignation of the former president Gotabaya Rajapaksa due to the country’s severest economic crisis in recent years.
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Anura Kumara Dissanayake Strong Lead
Partial results available over the culminating Sunday morning underscored the leader position of the SLFP’s Dissanayake with nearly 50% of the counted ballots. A candidate requires 51% of the total vote to win the election and Dissanayake’s pledges of anti-corruption and good governance seem to have significantly impacted voters. Lankans have been calling for structure adjustments after the economic crash and on the surface of it, Anura Kumara Dissanayake offers the changes in structure they want.
Coming second is Sajith Premadasa with 25.58% of votes. Incumbent, Ranil Wickremesinghe, seeking a second term has secured only 16% out of the total votes poll so far while the other serious contender from the opposition is Namal Rajapaksa, nephew of the former president ousted in the present crisis, who has secured little less than 3%.
Peaceful Voting Amid Curfew
A total of about 17 million people were entitled to vote in the Saturday election which turned out relatively uneventful. But authorities announced the curfew on Sunday morning and continued it till mid-afternoon local time till 0630 GMT on Sunday morning. However, the election process was not chaotic, and the voters exercised their franchise in a free manner.
Early Reactions and Congratulations
However, as the results are being released one after the other Anura Kumara Dissanayake has already started receiving congratulatory messages from supporters of his main opponents suggesting wider political acceptance of his imminent victory.
Our Foreign Minister Ali Sabry who campaigned for President Wickremesinghe also took to X (formerly Twitter) to accept the public’s decision saying, “Although I greatly campaigned with the presidential candidate Ranil Wickremesinghe the people of Sri Lanka exercised their freedom wisely and decided to vote for Anura Kumara Dissanayake.”
Likewise, another supporter of Premadasa, Colombo MP Harsha de Silva too has come out in support of the result. He said, “We campaigned hard for @sajithpremadasa but it was not to be. It is now clear that @anuradisanayake will be the new President of #SriLanka.
A New Direction for Sri Lanka?
Maybe one of the biggest boosts for Dissanayake was TNA spokesman MA Sumanthiran who pointed to the fact that Dissanayake had emerged victorious with 1325 without having to appeal to the racist’s sore racial or religious sentiments. This is especially the case in a country in which ethnic and religious tensions have been used to influence the outcome of an election.
The Road Ahead
As Anura Kumara Dissanayake nears the 51 required percentage to be declared the official Presidential winner of Sri Lanka, thereby the people are shifting their attention towards political stance of the next President of Sri Lanka. It may ignite a new beginning for the twenty-seven escaping island nation where demands for change, accountability, and effectiveness overshadow political and economic realms.
As I mentioned earlier, the official tally is yet to emerge but the sentiment on the ground is that Dissanayake has managed to resonate with the people’s sentiments and attitudes of a country that has been going through the ringer for several years now.