All top four contenders for the post of Sri Lanka’s President — Sajith Premadasa, incumbent President Ranil Wickremesinghe, Anura Kumara Dissanayaka, and Namal Rajapaksa — are intertwined by fate. In Sri Lanka, where only a handful of families control politics, all these have past associations — they have been friends, foes, and partners.
Ranil Wickremesinghe is 75 and the senior-most, both by age and his long innings in national politics. Namal Rajapaksa, on the other hand, is just 38 and the youngest.
Ranil, who won his first Parliament election in 1977, has been a fixture in Sri Lankan politics. The four-time prime minister, and an accidental President, he has got nine lives like a cat. Every time you write him off, he bounces back. This time, he is on shaky ground despite stabilising the bankrupt Indian Ocean island nation in record two years. In any other nation, his win would have been a foregone conclusion. But Sri Lanka is different.
Ranil is facing two formidable opponents — leader of the opposition and his one-time deputy Sajith Premadasa and ultra-Marxist party Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) leader Anura Kumara Dissanayaka, popularly known as AKD. The late and surprise entrant Namal Rajapaksa is also trying to halt Ranil in his tracks, making it the most complex and fiercely contested presidential election in Sri Lanka’s history.
Many political observers with an ear to the ground feel the current four-horse race will finally lead to a two-horse race, knocking off two other presidential hopefuls.
This will still be a tight race in a deeply divided and volatile island nation.
Some argue that it will be a Sajith versus AKD face-off on September 21, when 17 million islanders vote. Some disagree, claiming it will be Sajith versus Ranil in the final phase of election. They also feel that if Namal gets more votes, chances of Sajith brighten, diminishing the chances of Ranil and AKD. UNP leader Ranil is contesting as an Independent candidate for the first time in a new development for Sri Lanka.
The suave, Colombo elite Ranil is not unblemished. During his premiership between 2015 and 2020, he was accused of a multi-billion Sri Lankan rupee ‘Bond Scam’. Before that, in the late 1980s, as a powerful cabinet minister in his uncle and president JR Jayawardene and later in Ranasinghe Premadasa governments, he is accused of running a government-hit squad to eliminate the JVP guerillas.
According to some estimates, close to 10,000 suspected radicals and their family members either disappeared or were killed in Sri Lanka’s bloodiest phase. Ranil has always dismissed these charges as bogus. This makes him an enemy of the JVP and brings him closer to Sajith, who is his one-time deputy in the undivided United Nationalist Party or UNP. The UNP led by Ranil’s uncle, the legendary JR, and later by his deputy R Premadasa, who is Sajith’s father, had ended the terror of JVP in the most brutal manner.
AKD is heading the same JVP which has shunned violence and accepted ballot over bullet. However, not many are convinced about its commitment to democracy and a liberal society. The JVP is largely known as a party of trade unions and working class which is still hoping for a revolution, which has eluded them for decades.
The 2022 unrest, which forced President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee the nation in the middle of the night, opened a huge opportunity for the JVP to take centre-stage in politics.
Holding the established dynasts accountable for the collapse of the nation’s economy, the JVP campaigned vigorously for an equal society. But some feel it peaked too early and may not be able to translate the same sentiments into votes in this election.
The JVP has the blood of tens of thousands of innocent people on its hands and there is a fear and contempt among a large number of people about AKD. Its violent past is refusing to go away, even though today’s leadership is moving earth and heaven to change that perception.
Sajith Premadasa is riding on a sympathy wave. He lost the 2019 presidential election to Gotabaya Rajapaksa and later became leader of the opposition in Sri Lanka’s Parliament. Sajith is banking on the traditional UNP voters (his party SJB is a breakaway faction of the UNP. More than 90 per cent of the UNP leaders and followers are with him). Sajith is likely to get a major chunk of crucial minorities’ (Tamils and Muslims) votes in this election. Minorities are 25 per cent of Sri Lanka’s total population and vote as a block sometimes. Ranil is also likely to get sizable minorities votes because of his close association with them over the years. Sajith is considered a pro-India leader and a reasonable man to deal with.
The fourth important candidate in the fray, Namal Rajapaksa, is under no pressure to win in his maiden presidential election. He is just 38 and has been an MP for the past 14 years. He has also been a cabinet minister. He is contesting to save his father’s party SLPP and regroup the cadre. Namal’s decision to throw the gauntlet has enthused workers and voters. If he polls a respectable number of votes, he can win about 40-50 seats in the Parliament elections due in the next one year. He can either be a part of the coalition government if the results are hung or can decide to sit in the opposition, planning and aiming the next Presidential election in 2029.
Unlike his family elders, Namal is a pro-India leader with a few dozen close friends here. Time and again, he has maintained that he is fine with any country doing business with Sri Lanka, but is against any of them using Sri Lankan soil for anti-India activities.
After the sudden developments in Bangladesh, India is closely watching the Presidential election in Sri Lanka. With the victory of pro-China leaders in Maldives, Nepal and now Bangladesh, Sri Lanka is too important for India.
Sri Lanka is known for missing opportunities since its independence from Great Britain in 1948. The ordinary people of the island nation are hoping against hope that this time, things will change for the better.
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