Editorial

As the final lap of a somewhat lacklustre election campaign negotiates the bend, 15.9 million voters will be entitled to pick a President of their choice next Saturday, November 16.

Back in 2015, many who voted for the outgoing President Maithripala Sirisena believed he would be the last of the Executive Presidents in the country. Despite a solemn pledge to ensure that would be the case, the early innocence of a well-meaning President from a rural background developed into a craving to cling on to that controversial office.

It is something that afflicts most of those who sit in that high chair. It was only when reality dawned, too late in the day however, that he would not get a second term that he mustered a bungled attempt to abolish the office. And so, we have yet another election for a President at an estimated cost of Rs. 7 billion from the public’s purse.

This time round, there are no pretences or promises to abolish the Executive Presidency. The two principal candidates are ominously silent on the subject, and it is not even high on the list of election issues. Despite the wings of such a President being clipped to a large extent by the 19th Amendment to the Constitution (19A), the President shall remain the Head of State and the Head of the Government. But it could be a case akin to an Emperor with no clothes. Parliament will be where the power will remain.

There’s clearly a sense of disillusionment among the people with their elected leaders. That was known for some time, and this newspaper’s teams that fanned out into the countryside, both in the towns and the rural areas seem to confirm this from their findings. It is no exaggeration to say that despite all the platform rhetoric, manifestos, the promises and the campaigning, or probably because of it, apart from the diehard party workers and the opportunists, there still remains an apathy and consequently, considerable number of ‘floating voters’ – the undecided.

According to the analysis of our teams that spread out, the crucial northern vote is more against one candidate than for the other. The once mighty SLFP vote, which though reduced to a single digit percentage now could also tilt the balance of power in favour of one candidate. Both these vote banks, one large, one small can be a factor in a close election call in marginal seats.

On the other hand, the minority ethno-religious vote which was in 2015 squarely with one candidate has been dented, reducing its potency to propel that one candidate over the bar in a close finish in the south. That candidate will also not get the JVP vote that was available in 2015, and would hope that should there be a need for a second count, that particular vote bank would come in his favour.

The Easter Sunday attacks seem to have given new meaning to ‘national security’ and the experiences of those whose businesses were attacked in the post-Easter blowback against one community have been to the disadvantage of the ruling party even though those who unleashed the violence and boycott campaign may have been spearheaded by elements associated with the Opposition forces. The anti -incumbency factor also has to be taken into account and it is a fairly well established fact that young voters usually vote anti-establishment.

You have the candidate who entered the race late picking up some momentum with his message resonating with the rural poor. An initially controversial public announcement has gained that candidate support among women, who see him as understanding and sympathetic to their personal issues. And then you have on the other side, a ‘ralla’ (an unceasing wave) towards a former President especially in the southern hinterland, which will make next week’s contest, by all accounts a fairly close and predicting an outright winner, a difficult one.

And yet, there are those who remain undecided right up to the last week. Various universities, offices and even hospitals have embarked upon unofficial polls, something the National Elections Commission (NEC) has frowned upon. These ‘results’ need not be authentic as those ‘voters’ may want to please their bosses, depending on any known political inclination of the boss.

There is a deep sense of frustration among the voting public on the quality of the country’s political leadership. The main contenders have recognised the baggage they carry with them. They seem to realise that they cannot launch a lone crusade, and the hangers-on hoping for plum cabinet or other public office are only doing them a disfavour by their very appearance. But they cannot be shaken off. What seems to worry the voting public is that despite the two front-runners being new candidates, those campaigning for them are the same set of rascals.

Onetime British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill who won a world war, but lost an election soon after was therefore rather ambivalent on democracy. Known for his quotable quotes, he said the best argument against democracy was to have a five minute chat with an average voter. Then, he added, “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all other forms that have been tried from time to time”. That appears to be the dilemma faced by the Sri Lankan voter.

The election ‘unusuma’ (heat) was absent from this election campaign. For better or for worse, the stringent NEC rulings on hoardings, banners and buntings, meetings, house-to-house campaigning, use and abuse of state power was a dampener. It diluted the customary campaigning the country has seen previously. Often those diktats from the NEC went over the top. But at least so far, we have not seen a bloodbath among rival party cadres that is often an inevitable ingredient in these campaigns.

As for the issues, they are different from 2015. As we said the Executive Presidency is not a contentious issue. It will crop up again only when the vanquished starts complaining that the victor is abusing the office post-Nov. 16. Otherwise 19A has made the President a virtual non-entity. The cost of living and employment are always of major concern; so too national security thrust into the forefront after the Easter bombings, though in the north, the regional parties have not given up drumming the same tune by harking back to the time the LTTE was liquidated on the battlefield.

Still, this election has not been entirely issue-based. Many subjects have escaped the attention of the candidates and alliances in the run-up to the election. How Sri Lanka will cope with climate change, for instance. What are the future policies and how best Sri Lanka can handle competing pressures from the United States-India-Japan axis against the emerging influence and spreading tentacles of China in this part of the world? Sri Lanka’s terrifying foreign debt crisis has hardly been discussed.

It is a difficult call for the 15.9 million voters; but a call they will have to make.