Sri Lanka Head To The Polls

[mkrishnan]

If the outcome of Sri Lanka's bitterly contested presidential election were decided solely by which candidate had the largest billboard, then incumbent Mahinda Rajapaksa could sleep easily in his bed.

At the international airport near Colombo, a huge hoarding shows the president, dressed entirely in white, a beatific smile beaming across his face. His advisers believe that as voters go to the polls tomorrow, their best asset is the candidate himself, a man who oversaw the defeat of separatist rebels and ended a brutal 30-year civil war.

Indeed, less than a year ago, after government troops crushed the rebels of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the authorities responded with a deluge of flag-waving celebrations that projected the president as something half-way between a God and a king, no one could have guessed that eight months later Mr Rajapaksa would be engaged in an ugly political dog-fight. And yet he is.

Ironies abound in Sri Lanka. The first is that Mr Rajapaksa's opponent, his former army chief Sarath Fonseka, is a man the president initially considered an ally and who was equally feted for his role in defeating the LTTE. The second is that while this election will split Sri Lanka's ethnic majority – both Mr Rajapaksa and his main opponent are staunch Sinhala Buddhist nationalists – the outcome may depend on whether the minority Tamil community bothers to vote and who it votes for. The final quirk is that many Tamils appear set to vote for Mr Fonseka, the man who oversaw a military operation that – according to UN estimates – resulted in the death of up to 10,000 Tamil civilians.

As voting day has drawn nearer, so the contest has become increasingly nasty. Reports suggest there have been up to 800 incidents of pre-poll violence and that four people have been killed. Yesterday, the opposition coalition backing Mr Fonseka raised the stakes further by claiming it had evidence the government was planning a "coup d'état of sorts" if the election went against it and that it would deploy troops to try to hang on to power.

Up to 15 armoured personnel carriers had been moved into the city for this purpose, it claimed. It added that in such circumstances its supporters would "take to the streets" if the will of the people was ignored.

"We have to be ready to defend our franchise," Ranil Wickremesinghe, head of the United National Party (UNP), and one of the main figures in the coalition that secured Mr Fonseka's candidacy, told a press conference. "We are making counter plans. We will get on to the streets if necessary.

[Article Continues] (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/tamils-may-hand-power-to-general-who-crushed-tigers-1877868.html)"

It seems quite surreal that the Army General who led Sri Lanka to it's victory over the Liberation Tigers (with the attendant war crimes committed on both sides) could win , in essence, on a platform of improving the rule of law in Sri Lanka and providing protection to ethnic minorities including Tamils (see quote below).

In April 2006, a female LTTE suicide bomber infiltrated army HQ. She blew herself up next to General Fonseka's car and nearly killed him. Within days of returning from hospital, the major operation against the LTTE was launched. He has pledged to abolish the executive presidency, secure the rights of Sri Lanka's minorities, including Tamils, and establish media freedom. A US green card holder, he has two daughters who attend university in Oklahoma.

I'm not sure I believe it, but Fonseka sounds like a better candidate for Sri Lankan stability than Rajapaksa. My thoughts go out for a peaceful election and no violence or scare tactics.

[Eraserhead]

Lets hope that whoever wins does something for the Tamils.

[mkrishnan]

Lets hope that whoever wins does something for the Tamils.

Yeah... it's a tough situation. The LTTE engaged in all kinds of terrorist actions, at home and abroad, and I don't justify them, but at the same time, the government clearly felt unbound by any kind of moral or ethical dilemma associated with systematically mistreating a sizable minority group. It would be nice to see the end of the war followed by some real civil stability on that island.

[Counterfit]

Yeah... it's a tough situation. The LTTE engaged in all kinds of terrorist actions, at home and abroad, and I don't justify them, but at the same time, the government clearly felt unbound by any kind of moral or ethical dilemma associated with systematically mistreating a sizable minority group. It would be nice to see the end of the war followed by some real civil stability on that island.

Bingo. My thoughts exactly.

[mkrishnan]

Early news reports like this one (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/expatnews/7078255/Sri-Lankas-Tamils-trudge-to-polls-in-first-post-war-election.html) are indicating peace at polling sites, with potentially large turnouts.

Tamil politician Dharmalingam Sithadthan said there was enthusiastic polling in Tamil areas although many had failed to register as voters because they had been driven from place to place by years of fighting.

"We saw a slow start, but voting is very peaceful," Sithadthan said.

In the majority Sinhalese capital, Colombo, there was enthusiasm and turnout appeared to be high, according to voters and officials.

"I have been voting at this booth for over 20 years but never saw a crowd like this," said Mohamed Sallel, a businessman casting his ballot in the city's Borella commercial area.

Doctor Nimalka Perera turned up to vote on her way to the Colombo National Hospital, but ended up standing in line for an hour to vote at a polling booth inside a school building.

"When I first came here, the queue was too long so I went back and came two hours later on my way to the hospital and found the line even longer," Perera said.

[Macky-Mac]

a different report (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/26/sri-lanka-presidential-el_n_437002.html) suggests that Tamils aren't voting in large numbers;

...While voting among the Sinhalese majority appeared strong, turnout was sparse in some northern Tamil areas, their traditional bastions where the most intense fighting drove hundreds of thousands from their homes....

...Overall turnout was around 70 percent, but only between 15 and 20 percent of registered voters turned up at the polls in the north, where the Tamils worst affected by the war lived. Turnout may have been further suppressed by an early morning explosion in the northern city of Jaffna that election monitors said was a grenade attack....

and that Fonseka wasn't allowed to vote;

...The opposition expressed fears of vote rigging, an accusation that may have been bolstered when Fonseka himself was prevented from voting because his name was not on registration lists....

how bizarre

[mkrishnan]

how bizarre

It will be interesting to see what happens -- if Fonseka loses and it looks hinky, he has the potential to be another Mousavi (or Abdullah Abdullah). He's already made allegations that Rajapaksa is trying to interfere with the election process, and some of them seem credible.

Not to mention the issue of whether the some 80,000 Tamils still in concentration camps are being allowed to vote.

[Macky-Mac]

now there are reports that Rajapaksa's supporters may mount a legal challenge saying Fonseka isn't eligible

from Bangkok (http://www.bangkokpost.com/breakingnews/166598/top-s-lankan-challenger-ineligible-govt);

Sri Lanka's government said on Tuesday it would challenge the legitimacy of leading opposition candidate Sarath Fonseka, who contested the country's first post-war presidential election.

"We are seeking a court order on the suitability of this candidate because he is not eligible to be declared as a candidate," Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama told reporters.

He said they would seek court action to have Fonseka ruled out of the race after the former four-star general was unable to vote in Tuesday's election because his name was not on the electoral list.

Responding to suggestions from ruling-party lawmakers that Fonseka could be disqualified, the country's independent Elections Commissioner gave the opposition figurehead resounding backing in a statement earlier on Tuesday.

"Not having one's name on the electoral list is not a disqualification," Dayananda Dissanayake said.

Bogollagama said the government would challenge this assessment.

"What the Election Commissioner has merely expressed is an opinion, but the courts have the ultimate authority to interpret the law," Bogollagama said....

sounds like this could get messy

[mkrishnan]

Well, Rajapaksa is being announced (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/28/world/asia/28lanka.html?hp) as the winner with around 60% of the vote. Fonseka's supporters claim he is essentially being held in house arrest, and that the election was rigged. (Interestingly, there was some controversy over Fonseka during the day of the election, where he was himself not allowed to vote because he somehow was not on the electorate list, and even a claim from Rajapaksa supporters that this made him ineligible to run in the first place).

They're also confirming the statements in Macky-Mac's link indicating very low turnout in Tamil regions, which is disappointing.

We'll see what comes next.

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Mahinda Rajapaksa, Sri Lanka’s president, handily won Tuesday’s election with nearly 60 percent of the vote, state television announced Wednesday. But his opponent, a retired army general who had been a close ally until a few months ago, rejected the results and said he would seek to have the vote negated, according to news reports.

It was unclear on what grounds the challenger, Sarath Fonseka, would contest the election. Unofficial results on the Sri Lankan electoral commission’s Web site indicated that Mr. Rajapaksa had won by a commanding margin. An official announcement was expected Wednesday afternoon.

Mr. Fonseka spent the day in a Colombo hotel, which the government surrounded with commandoes. Officials from the coalition of parties backing him worried that he would be arrested.

Lucien Rajakarunanyake, a government spokesman, said that the troops outside the hotel were merely for safety. “He is free to leave at any time,” the spokesman said.

But Rauf Hakeem, head of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, said that General Fonseka was unable to leave and feared for his safety.

“This is an overreaction to a perceived threat which they think is emanating from him,” he said, alluding to government hints that General Fonseka, who retired from the military in November to run for president, might try to mount a military coup. While saying it was too early to concede, he said that the opposition “would be quite willing to bow down to a clear mandate from the people.”

The atmosphere at the hotel where General Fonseka took refuge was tense, with heavily armed soldiers standing guard outside.

Several officials from his campaign said that they had been harassed by security forces, but these accounts were impossible to verify independently.

A long night of counting ballots confirmed that turnout in northern Tamil strongholds was very low, in the single digits in some war-hit areas, while voters had flocked to the polls in Mr. Rajapaksa’s southern stronghold.

[Macky-Mac]

it looks like things have taken a turn for the worse for Gen. Fonseka....from a BBC report (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8487331.stm);

Sri Lanka police 'raid Fonseka campaign HQ'

The Colombo campaign office of defeated Sri Lankan presidential candidate Gen Sarath Fonseka has been raided by 40 policemen, his supporters say.

The say that Criminal Investigation Department (CID) personnel arrested 13 people in the raid.

The government has given almost no information on the operation, which saw a street in Colombo cordoned off.

The military excluded all journalists from the leafy street where the general's campaign office is situated.

Gen Fonseka has refused to accept his defeat in the elections.

He argues that his supporters were intimidated and the result was fixed.

'Coup plan'

The BBC's Charles Haviland in Colombo says that dozens of security forces were seen arriving in the street where Gen Fonseka ran his office from his home.

"They want to take all [my] people into custody and take them to the police station, saying that we had been planning a coup from that office," Gen Fonseka told the BBC Tamil service.

"All nonsense. Right now they are packing up all our computers, all our equipment, and they are trying to take all the staff to police station."

On Thursday the general said that he wanted to leave the country because of death threats.

As votes were being counted on Wednesday, troops surrounded him inside the hotel, where his campaign was based, on suspicion he was plotting a coup.

'Falsified'

Opposition lawyer Shiral Lakthilaka said that dozens of CID officers escorted by commandos arrested 13 men who had been involved in the general's election campaign, all of them retired soldiers or officers.

He said they were now being held incommunicado even though police found none of the weapons or explosives that they said they were looking for.

No senior police officials were able to provide information to the BBC - one said he knew nothing, others were unavailable by telephone.

A defence official would only say an investigation was going on.

The government had earlier accused the general of planning to assassinate his victorious rival, President Mahinda Rajapaksa....

[Counterfit]

This is exactly what they didn't need.

[Macky-Mac]

and now the losing candidate has been arrested (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8504882.stm)

Sri Lanka election loser Sarath Fonseka arrested

The defeated candidate in Sri Lanka's presidential election, Gen Sarath Fonseka, has been arrested, news reports have said.

Gen Fonseka was defeated by incumbent Mahinda Rajapaksa last month by six million votes to four million.

Gen Fonseka rejected the results and vowed to challenge them in court.

The government has been seeking legal advice to bring a court martial against the general on charges of plotting to overthrow the administration.

Gen Fonseka was in charge of Sri Lanka's army when it defeated the Tamil Tiger rebels last year after a destructive civil war lasting more than a quarter of a century.

However, he fell out with President Rajapaksa soon after and the pair fought a bitter election campaign.

The initial allegations brought by the government are of "committing military offences", military spokesman Maj-Gen Prasad Samarasinghe said.....

[mkrishnan]

The government is currently making some promises of due process, with apparent intent to try him for sedition.

http://beta.thehindu.com/news/international/article106237.ece

Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa has conveyed to leader of the opposition Ranil Wickremesinghe that the former Army Chief and defeated opposition presidential candidate, General (retired) Sarath Fonseka, will be released if he is proven innocent of the charges levelled against him.

On Friday, Mr. Wickremesinghe had called on Mr. Rajapaksa seeking the General’s immediate release, even as the Supreme Court admitted a petition challenging his detention and posted it for further hearing on February 23.

A report posted on the Department of Information website on Saturday said: “President Mahinda Rajapaksa informed the Opposition Leader that all facilities will be given to General Sarath Fonseka without causing him any inconvenience. [The] President had added that investigations into these allegations will be carried out immediately. General Fonseka will be released if he is proven not guilty of the charges, the President had assured.”

It quoted Mr. Rajapaksa as saying General Fonseka’s detention was an act of maintaining military law and discipline. It was not an act of revenge.

“The opposition requested the President to let someone else other than Mrs. Anoma Fonseka to take meals to Mr. Fonseka. The President said that the Army Commander will take a decision on this matter. He pointed out that Mrs. Fonseka is the most suitable person to take meals to the General. He recalled that Madam Shiranthi Rajapaksa had come to visit him similarly, when he had been serving prison terms in the past.”