‘Needs a change’: Sri Lankan leftist victory raises hopes and overcomes old divisions

President Dissanayake’s party won a two-thirds majority in parliament, including among Tamils ​​and Muslims. Will he be able to fulfill his promise of change?

When Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake left the polling station at the Abeysingharama Temple in Maradana, Colombo, on Thursday, Sulaiman called out to him, asking him to stop and listen to his grievances. Police quickly approached Sulaiman and asked him to leave the scene.

“I want [Dissanayake] hear the woes of my people,” Sulaiman said later. “When the former government cremated a baby during the COVID-19 pandemic, I protested. I spoke in the name of my religion. Justice has not been served to the Muslim people.”

Sulaiman’s hope that Dissanayake will deliver the justice his predecessors failed to find echoes across Sri Lanka, which voted overwhelmingly for the center-left leader in September’s presidential election. Now, that hope will be tested like never before.

Dissanayake’s National People’s Power (NPP) won an overwhelming majority in Thursday’s parliamentary election, securing 159 seats in a 225-member house – representing a comfortable two-thirds majority. The main opposition, Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), under its leader Sajith Premadasa, won just 40 seats.

Former president Ranil Wickremesinghe’s New Democratic Front secured five seats, and the Rajapaksa family’s Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), which dominated the country’s politics for much of the past two decades, won just three seats.

Samanmalee Gunasinghe of the NPP, who contested and won from Colombo, said: “We are happy that we can now work for the people. They have shown that they need a change from the old politics.”

Vote for change

According to political analyst Aruna Kulatunga, this is the first time since 1977 – when Sri Lanka changed its parliamentary system to proportional representation – that a single party has won a clear majority. This is also the first time that the sitting president has the numbers needed to pass legislation in parliament without having to rely on any allies or coalition partners.

“The importance of this outcome, therefore, is that the political fabric of Sri Lanka, fragmented along racial, religious and ideological lines, has the opportunity to unite around a single party,” said Kulatunga, “without the negotiations that occurred in previous coalition governments and the consequent weakening of the electoral promises made”.

With a two-thirds majority, Dissanayake can now amend the constitution. The NPP previously promised a referendum on a new constitution.

Expectations from the NPP are high. Led by the Marxist-leaning Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna of Dissanayake, the NPP also includes several organizations, including civil society groups that came together during the 2022 protests against the government of then-president Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who was ousted from power.

Vasantha Raj, 38, a daily wage earner from Dehiwala, Colombo, said he did not know the names of the NPP candidates contesting his area, but he voted for the alliance – no matter who represented it.

“We have been voting for the same people for years and nothing has changed. This time we will see what these [o NPP] will do,” said Raj.

The rise

Dissanayake, whose political fortunes rose sharply after the 2022 protests, focused his election campaign on strengthening the country’s economy and combating widespread corruption. At the heart of the 2022 protests was anger over the collapse of Sri Lanka’s economy under the Rajapaksa family – Gotabaya’s older brother Mahinda was prime minister.

Wickremesinghe, who took office after the Rajapaksas were forced from power, stabilized the economy, using loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other lenders. But as part of the deal with the IMF, he also introduced severe austerity measures, cut social security measures and raised taxes.

MF Sareena, 63, who accompanied her 83-year-old mother to a voting booth in Dematagoda, Colombo, said she also hoped the new government would fight corruption and offer help to the poor.

“My mother is very sick. She is old and I am taking care of her. We find it difficult to survive every day. Food prices are high and medicines are unaffordable. We hope things change soon,” said Sareena.

On Friday, after all the results were announced, Nihal Abeysinghe, secretary of the National People’s Power, acknowledged the burden of hopes that the party carries. “We will ensure that we do not misuse this power just like the people who have done this in the past,” he said at a press conference.

Tamil support

The stakes are particularly high in the north of the country, where the Tamil community voted for the NPP, breaking with its pattern of voting for Tamil parties. The NPP secured the majority of seats in the north. The north and east of the country, where the Tamil population is largely based, were the epicenters of the bloodiest battles during a three-decade civil war between Tamil rebels and the Sri Lankan army. The war ended in 2009 when Sri Lankan armed forces decimated the Tamil armed leadership.

Ahilan Kadirgamar, a senior lecturer in sociology at the University of Jaffna, said that in the weeks leading up to the parliamentary elections, there was a clear groundswell of support for the NPP from the Tamil community in the north. Many Tamil voters, he said, were angry with their community’s political leaders for not delivering on promises of a better deal for them.

Now the hard work for the NPP begins, he said. To address the concerns of the people of the north and east, the Sri Lankan government must return land taken by the military and other government departments, especially during the civil war. The government, he said, must address the concerns of the country’s Tamil and Muslim minorities, frequent targets of xenophobia.

“This is not an easy job,” said Kadirgamar.

Originally published by Al Jazeera on 11/16/2024

By Aanya Wipulasena