Colombo (AsiaNews) – President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s governing party alliance won in local elections in the central province of Uva and in the Northern Province, the latter scene of war for decades between the Sri Lankan military and the Liberation Tiger of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The poll was held last Saturday and saw no major incident; however, allegations of voter intimidation and electoral malpractice have been made.
In Uva President Rajapaksa’s United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) won 25 of the 34 seats available. The main opposition party, the United National Party (UNP), won only seven seats.
In the northern province the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), which is close to the Tamil Tiger rebels, won five seats in the municipal elections in Vavuniya against two for the two government parties.
No surprises in Jaffna, capital of the Northern Province, where the UPFA took 13 seats against eight for the TNA.
President Rajapaksa reacted to the results by saying he was satisfied with the outcome at the ballot box. Conversely, the TNA has accused the government of using its power and influence in an “unprecedented manner” to achieve its desired result.
A TNA lawmaker from the Jaffna district slammed the “government’s strategy of inducement and intimidation” towards the “poorer areas” of the province, the one most affected by decades of war between the military and Tamil Tigers.
“I challenge the government to declare the general or presidential election after releasing 300,000 internally displaced persons. Then we can know where our people stand,” he said in a contentious tone.
Similarly, the main election monitoring group PAFFREL challenged the Election Department’s voter turnout figure of 22.1 per cent in Jaffna, saying the actual turnout could be as high as 40 to 50 per cent.
Mr. Rohana Hettiarchchi, acting executive director of the People’s Action for Free and Fair Elections, said they found out that polling cards were issued to people now dead.
Sunil Jayasekara, a member of the Center for Monitoring Election Violence (CMEV), told AsiaNews that “of the 94,807 polling cards [issued], only 56,513 have been delivered” to voters. The remaining voters “have either gone abroad or been displaced or living elsewhere in the country. Some have died”.
For its part the Jaffna Municipal Council said that it had 100,417 eligible voters on its list and that 94,807 polling cards were issued for distribution. “But many of voters could not cast their votes because they did not have their National Identity cards,” Sunil Jayasekara retorted.
Furthermore, the governing alliance launched a massive advertising campaign that left opposition parties in the dust, even as allegations were made that the alliance’s parties used threats and pressure to secure their victory.
“Many fisher groups have been threatened by government supporters that if they did not vote for the ruling party, they would not get the permit to fish,” Sunil Jayasekara said.
Others have alleged that the recent arrest of the Tamil Tigers’ new leader was actually a ploy to gain votes in the south.
In any event, in Jaffna many locals were not into the election. For V. Anandasangari, a member of the pro-independence Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF), “the low voter turnout was because Jaffna residents were not interested in this election; they were even scared to participate openly at election rallies”
