By Feizal Samath
COLOMBO, Dec 17 1999 (IPS)

Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga and her main rival, opposition leader Ranil Wickremasinghe, are running neck-and-neck in the presidential race, which outcome will be decided by voters Dec. 21.

“Never have we seen such a close election … Whoever wins, would do so with a narrow margin …,” predicts Prof Siripala Hettige, a well known sociologist at the University of Colombo.

Some 11 million people will be voting in the one-day election, which was called by President Kumaratunga in October, a full year ahead of the end of her term in November 2000. Sri Lanka’s presidency is a most powerful executive post.

Kumaratunga is seeking a second term to enable her People’s Alliance (PA) to implement constitutional reforms designed to change the presidential system of government and end the ethnic conflict, both promises which were made in the last 1994 poll.

She says she was unable to fulfill these pledges due to the non-cooperation of the opposition United National Party (UNP) led by Wickremasinghe, a former prime minister. The reforms package has been stuck in Parliament for the past two years.

Wickremasinghe has pledged the immediate start of peace talks with the Tamil rebels, and the establishment of an interim administration with rebel support in the north and the east. He has promised to revitalise the economy and create jobs for the jobless, and a dole for unemployed graduates.

“I think there is a swing towards Ranil and he can get the 51 percent needed to win,” says Lalith Allahakoon, editor of the independent ‘Daily Mirror’ newspaper.

The winner must obtain 50 percent plus one vote under Sri Lanka’s preferential voting system. The last three elections, in 1982, 1989 and 1994, have produced outright winners.

When the verdict is not clear, a second count is taken of the second preference marked on ballot papers of voters other than those whose first preference was either of the two top candidates. In the polling booth, voters have to put down three names on their ballot papers, in order of preference.

If next week’s counting goes into a second round, the second preference on the ballots, if they are of Kumaratunga and Wickremasinghe, will be added to their previous tallies to decide the victor.

Election rules also provide for a third preference count; failing which the Election Commission declares whoever is leading as the winner. Should the counting go beyond the first round in the Dec. 21 poll, results could be delayed, officials said.

Some 60 foreign observers are expected to arrive for monitoring duties, together with some 12,000 local monitors. Earlier this month, the Election Commission, under pressure from the government, informed private Sri Lankan poll monitors that they would not be allowed into polling booths.

Private monitors like PAFFREL or the People’s Action for Free and Fair Elections and the Centre for Monitoring Elections (CMEV) are legally not entitled to enter polling booths but senior presiding officers had always provided access.

The Kumaratunga government has accused independent groups of bias, and stopped funding support for the CMEV from the U.S-based ‘Asia Foundation’. It has also accused the poll monitors of trying to embarrass the government by exaggerating the violence.

A number of election-related incidents, including five murders, have been reported in the past month of campaigning. Most of the violence has been directed against the opposition UNP, which has said the government will stop at nothing even rigging the election.

President Kumaratunga had swept to power in 1994 ending the UNP’s 17 year rule, which, particularly the 1980s, is remembered as among the bloodiest periods in Sri Lankan history.

“I don’t think people have forgotten the period when 60,000- odd young people, according to rights groups, were killed by the military in trying to quell a revolt by a left-wing party,” said a university professor, who did not want to be named.

The left-wing party, JVP or People’s Liberation Front, which is now the third major party in the country, is expected to garner about 7 percent of the votes in next week’s election.

Though Kumaratunga is by far the most charismatic candidate, she has suffered a series of reversals recently, including serious battle-field losses against the Tamil Tiger separatists, considered one of the world’s best trained guerrilla army.

Her inability to end the war has distanced the island’s minority Tamils. “The Tamils are fed up with this government,” says commentator S. Sivaram. “All indications are that the Tamil vote would go enmasse to the UNP.”

Sivaram, a former Tamil rebel-turned-journalist who writes a weekly column in the ‘Midweek Mirror’ daily, said although the Tiger rebels have not expressed a view on the polls, the general belief is that they favour a UNP government.

Last month in a speech, rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran blasted the government and called Kumaratunga’s five-year rule a “curse” on the Tamils.

“This is a signal that the rebels don’t want Chandrika. In eastern Batticaloa for instance, which voted overwhelmingly for her last time, the tide has turned. The UNP is able to hold meetings in rebel areas which the PA cannot do,” said Sivaram.

Few Tamils living in the rebel-controlled area of Batticaloa are likely to walk to polling booths in government-held territory territory to vote anyway. “In some cases it would take half a day to get there. They simply won’t bother,” he added.

Defence analysts believe the rebels would like to see a UNP victory since peace talks will give them a chance to recharge their batteries, like it happened in 1995 when Kumaratunga took over the presidency and held peace talks which the rebels broke.

“It is the same scenario,” argues a pro-government newspaper editor. “The rebels would like a UNP government purely for this purpose.”

While Wickremasinghe is seen bending over backwards to please the Tamil minority, which represents about 20 percent of voters, the once left-leaning Kumaratunga has found unexpected support from nationalist and pro-Sinhala groups.

Dinesh Gunawardene, leader of the nationalist People’s United Front, has denounced Wickremasinghe’s plans to set up a rebel- guided administration in the north and the east.

A widely-believed view is that city, urban and a major part of the minority voters favour Wickremasinghe while Kumaratunga draws her strength mostly from the rural areas, where the bulk of Sri Lankans live.

The minority Muslim community, and Tamils of Indian origin, the plantation labour whose pro-Kumaratunga leader passed away on Oct. 30, are largely undecided. Their votes could be split between the two main candidates.

Only one of the president’s Tamil party allies are openly supporting her. Her staunchest ally, the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) whose leader Neelan Tiruchelvam was assassinated by suspected the Tigers in July this year, has deserted her, saying it intends to be neutral.

The TULF said the government had not responded to its pleas to end the war and begin talks with the Tigers, or mitigate the sufferings of Tamil civilians trapped in the war zone.

A pre-poll survey, preliminary results of which were released Tuesday revealed a yearning among people for political parties to work together for peace. The survey was based on a sample of 1,318 interviews in seven provinces, jointly undertaken by the Colombo University, institutions and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

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