No peace I On December 21 Chandrika Kumaratunga was reelected to a second six-year term as president of Sri Lanka.
› The main election issue was the war in the north and east of the island, and the still unresolved national question of the Tamil speaking people.
Chandrika won only 51%, down from 62% in 1994. This is largely because of her broken promises to bring peace and economic justice. Her Peoples Alliance Government has taken a hard line in the war against the "Tamil Tigers" (LTTE). Chandrika was hell-bent on a chauvinist campaign which aroused the rural masses. Her campaign was very successful in this sector. She also benefited from a sympathy vote after a bomb attack in her final campaign rally.
Unlike in 1994, Tamil-speakers rallied round Ranil Wickremesinga, leader of the right-wing opposition United National Party, who promised to negotiate with the LTTE if he became president. Wickremesinga received 43% of the vote.
The independent Electoral Violence Surveillance Centre said the election was "less than satisfactory" in more than a third of the country, as a result of 12 International Viewpoint #319 February 2000 n signt ballot-box stuffing, intimidation of voters, and misuse of the electoral machinery. Few people voted in the mainly Tamil northeast, where more than 2,000 polling stations were relocated at the last minute. Many abstained.
Just over 4% of voters supported the left regroupment candidate M. D. Nandana Gunathilaka. A member of the JVP, he was supported by the NSSP (Fourth International) and the Muslim United Liberation Front (MULF). These groups have been discussing and working together on a range of questions. The joint candidate was also supported by the Democratic Workers' Congress (DWC) which is mainly based among Tamil plantation workers.
Gunathilaka's electoral platform called for an end to the dictatorial executive presidency, an end to the war, peace and democracy under a left government, and resistance to WB, IMF & WTO neoliberal policies. In a separate document, the parties also reached a minimum basic agreement on the national question of the Tamil people.
In the 1980s, the JVP became involved in Sinhala chauvinism and violence. But in recent years it has resisted and opposed such tendencies.
Almost 24,000 voters (0.3%)