Presidential elections were held in Sri Lanka on 26 January 2010. They were the sixth presidential elections held in the country's history, and the first to be held following the conclusion of the Sri Lankan civil war. Incumbent president Mahinda Rajapaksa of the governing United People's Freedom Alliance was re-elected with 57.88% of the vote, defeating his main opponent Sarath Fonseka of the New Democratic Front, an opposition coalition backed by the United National Party. Fonseka received 40.15% of the vote, carrying the formerly LTTE-occupied Northern and Eastern Provinces. The remaining twenty candidates each garnered less than 0.5% of the popular vote.
The elections were announced on 23 November 2009 when president Rajapaksa decided to seek a fresh mandate prior to the expiration of his term in 2011. Nominations were accepted on 17 December 2009.
In 2005, Mahinda Rajapaksa was elected to his first 6-year term as president, defeating opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, the United National Party (UNP) candidate. Prior to the election, Mahinda Rajapaksa served as prime minister under president Chandrika Kumaratunga from 2004 to 2005. Rajapaksa won a narrow victory, winning 50.29% of the popular vote, and beating Wickremesinghe by a margin of a little more than 180,000 votes. The separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam had called for a boycott of the election in the Northern and Eastern provinces, resulting in a minimal turnout, which the opposition claimed resulted in their defeat.
The term of the office of the president is 6 years, and the 3rd Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka allows the president to call for an early presidential election after four years into their first term of office. Rajapaksa, whose first term began on 19 November 2005, had been constitutionally eligible to call an early presidential election since 19 November 2009. Accordingly, Rajapaksa informed the Commissioner of Elections about his intention to hold a presidential election before the end of his current term of office. He announced his intention via a Gazette Extraordinary, issued on 23 November 2009.
The elections would be the first presidential elections to be held in Sri Lanka since the end of the Sri Lankan civil war.
On 27 November 2009, Dayananda Dissanayake, Commissioner of Elections, issued that the presidential election would be scheduled for 26 January 2010. Nominations were accepted from 9.00am to 11.00am IST on 17 December 2009. Sri Lankans registered with the Department of Elections, and eligible to vote, totaled 14,088,500, a significant increase from 13,327,160 in the previous presidential elections held in 2005. Over 11,000 polling booths were set up across the country for receiving ballots.
In May 2009, the Sri Lanka Army tactfully defeated separatist the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, thus bringing an end to the 26-year long Sri Lankan civil war. A promise Sri Lanka's previous three presidents tried and failed to secure, the war victory greatly boosted the popularity of incumbent president Mahinda Rajapaksa, thus leading Rajapaksa's United People's Freedom Alliance to unprecedented victories in the provincial council elections following the war's end.
In November 2009, Rajapaksa called for an early presidential election almost two years prior to the expiration of his first term, and sought a fresh mandate and a longer term based on his current widespread support and popularity.
General Sarath Fonseka was considered a national hero for bringing an end to the Sri Lankan civil war as Commander of the Sri Lanka Army from 2005 to 2009. However, following the war victory, tensions grew between Fonseka and the incumbent president, with the former accusing Rajapaksa of sidelining him after the end of the war. Opposition parties expected early elections and approached Fonseka, asking him to run as a "common candidate" for the opposition against Rajapaksa.
After weeks of rumours, Fonseka eventually retired from the military in November 2009 and announced his candidacy two weeks later. He ran as the candidate of the New Democratic Front, using the swan symbol. He was backed by a number of opposition parties, including the United National Party, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, and the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, and also signed a memorandum of understanding with Tamil National Alliance leader R. Sampanthan.
Apart from Rajapaksa and Fonseka, 20 other candidates had their nominations accepted, and appeared on ballot papers. One nominationâÂÂNelson Perera of the Sri Lanka Progressive FrontâÂÂwas rejected on technical grounds. This was the most candidates in a Sri Lankan presidential election at the time, breaking the record of 13 in the 2005 presidential election.
Sri Lankan police received nearly 975 election-related complaints, and 375 arrests were made relative thereto. The Centre for Monitoring Election Violence (CMEV) had recorded 809 incidents from 23 November 2009, when the elections were officially announced, to 25 January 2010. PeopleâÂÂs Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL) recorded 666 incidents between 17 December 2009 and 25 January 2010. The UN, United States, and EU expressed concern over the levels of electoral violence. Election monitoring groups stated that the election was the most violent election the country had seen in more than 20 years. Although supporters of both main candidates were blamed for the incidents, the responsibility for most was pinned on Rajapaksa supporters. However, government politician Wimal Weerawansa accused the opposition of orchestrating violence against their own supporters and meetings in order to blame Rajapaksa supporters. According to the National Polls Observation Center, criminal gangs and deserters from the army were employed to incite violence.
The government promised tight security on the day of the election, deploying over 68,000 policemen to keep the polls safe, with the Sri Lankan Military providing additional support. The election monitoring group Centre for Free and Fair Elections deployed 6,500 monitors on election day, with the PAFFREL deploying a further 6,000, including 14 foreign monitors. The government denied rumours of possible post-election violence, with Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama saying, "I don't think the people of Sri Lanka have time for street protests. It has never happened."
Election day was largely peaceful, with a few minor incidents reported. According to Inspector General of Police Mahinda Balasuriya, no major incidents occurred during the election. A number of explosions, however, were heard in Jaffna and Vavuniya in the north of the country during the day.
There were hundreds of violent incidents during the run-up to the election. Officially, there were four murders related to the election:
The CMEV has linked a fifth death to the elections:
There were accusations of widespread misuse of state property during the election campaign. Election observers and advocacy groups questioned the fundamental fairness of the campaign, accusing Rajapaksa of using state resources to finance his run. State-owned institutions paid for numerous advertisements supporting Rajapaksa, while public officials, state owned buildings and vehicles were allegedly used for Rajapaksa's campaign. State-owned television stations and news channels gave extensive coverage to Rajapaksa's campaign, with little to no mention of opposition candidates. Election commissioner Dayananda Dissanayake criticised the government for their misuse of state resources. Dissanayake claimed that the state media violated his guidelines, government institutions misbehaved, and in protest Dissanayake asked for approval to resign: "I request to be released," he said, just after he announced the results.
Postal voting for the presidential election took place on 12 and 13 January 2010. A grace period was granted until noon on 26 January for postal voters. Applications for this form of absentee voting totalled 458,154, with 401,118 applications accepted by the Elections Department. More than 80% of postal voters cast their votes on 12 and 13 January, this period ending with "no major incidents" according to the National Polls Observation Centre and the People's Action for Free and Fair Election (PAFFREL).
Voting for the presidential election began at 7:00 am on 26 January 2010. A total of 11,098 election centres and 888 counting centres were set up throughout the country. The Elections Commissioner had requested that voters cast their ballots early in the day.
Rajapaksa voted in the morning at Medamulana, as did opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe in Colombo. NDF candidate Fonseka did not vote, claiming that he had not been allowed to do so despite his eligibility. The government later challenged this, stating that if he were not qualified to vote, he would "not (be) entitled to become elected". It was announced that legal action would be sought against his candidacy, although the election commissioner had ruled that he was eligible to run in the election. By the time voting ended at 4.00 pm, over 70% of eligible voters had turned out, though in the Northern and Eastern provinces, figures were less than 20%. Sri Lanka's stock market recorded an all-time high on election day; the Colombo Stock Exchange jumped 1.58%, putting it up 131% since the end of the war.
Voter turnout was 74.5%, with 10,495,451 voting out of the 14,088,500 voters registered. Of these, 10,393,613 were ruled valid votes, with 101,838 rejected. According to the end result, Rajapaksa was elected to a second term of office with 6,015,934 votes, or 57.88% of the vote. Fonseka finished second with 4,173,185 votes, or 40.15%. Fonseka did not accept the results, and declared that legal action would be taken. Supporters of Rajapaksa took to the streets on the announcement of the result, waving national flags and lighting firecrackers. Rajapaksa called his victory "a choice of the people" and declared himself president of everyone in the country.
On the morning of 27 January, the Sri Lankan military surrounded a hotel where Fonseka and a number of opposition politicians had convened. The military claimed that 400 armed army deserters had gathered there, and demanded their surrender. Fonseka accused the military of preparing to arrest him if he won the elections. However, according to a military spokesman, they were there merely as a preventive measure, as the purpose of the gathering was uncertain. The military later arrested 10 men, who the opposition claimed were members of Fonseka's security contingent and not army deserters.
At a press briefing held on Thursday, 28 January, the Director of the Media Centre for National Security, Lakshman Hulugalle, told reporters that Gen. Fonseka moved into the hotel with over 70 retired army officers and deserters to plot the assassination of victorious President Mahinda Rajapaksa and his family. The Sri Lankan Ministry of Defence reported that they were still looking for evidence to prove Fonseka's involvement.
The 3rd Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka states that if a president was re-elected for a second term via an early presidential election, their second term starts on the next date corresponding to the date of the beginning of their first term. As such, Mahinda Rajapaksa was inaugurated for his second term of office at a ceremony held on the footsteps of the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo, on 19 November 2010. His oath of office was administered by Chief Justice Asoka de Silva.