FACTS AND FIGURES

By: Eric Fernando A.C.M.A.

Mr. Mahinda Attanayaka should be complemented for preparing an election forecast which will provide education to
those interested in the field of statistics.

To begin with, we are living in a dynamic society and extrapolations of past trends, using trend lines, based on the method of least squares, is not recommended, unless of course there is reasonable evidence to assume that the future will obey the past.

Two of his assumptions are :

All people who voted for JVP and PA in 2001 will vote for UPFA in 2004
All people who voted for UNP in 2001 will vote for UNP in 2004.

It would be naive to expect that the present government will continue to be as attractive as they were in 2001 or conversely UPFA partners have not enhanced their goodwill and that voter preferences are static. Further, the current situation is so different due to certain parties and other pressure groups entering the UPFA perhaps on the recognition that the need of the hour is to defeat the common enemy the LTTE and its agents with ostensible authority.

In my opinion a forecast is an assessment of future probable events. The impact the JHU will make on the votes caste in their favour defies quantification and is believed to have a wide dispersion with a significant standard deviation from one area to the other. The writer of this article may be pleased to assume that JHU will command the respect of 12% of the voters but this is not based on a sample study but apparently purely subjective

He continues to say.

"JHU will extract equal no. of votes from UNP and from UPFA."

If so, how can the writer say that

All people who voted for JVP and PA in 2001 will vote for UPFA in 2004
All people who voted for UNP in 2001 will vote for UNP in 2004

This to me is a serious contradiction..

It is possible that the article under reference may not have been correctly understood by me but it is far from clear as to how JHU can steal the 12% votes. The most I understand from the article is that the writer is trying to claim that JHU will erode the vote bank of the UNP than the UPFA. There seems to be no supporting evidence to consolidate this view and once again this is an assumption. A further assumption of the writer creates further confusion.

What is needed is an objective assessment.To do so, one needs to go in to a sample of a reasonable size and employ random sampling methods to ensure that every item in the population is given an equal chance of being selected. The size of sample and the confidence intervals are correlated and such an exercise will offer a reasonable guide to predict the outcome at varying levels of confidence. These are prerequisites to any sampling survey and any predictions by using ones gut feelings will be of no use. There is little to suggest that these requirements have been met.

Extrapolation has its limitations as already discussed. We have two more weeks to go and the events during this period can make a material change to the final results. There are hidden reserves in any party and the strategy that each party will adopt in the next two weeks can have a significant effect on the expected result.

In my opinion, the voter is still in a confused state as the entry of the JHU has caused total confusion and the voter is not at all certain which way to go. Under such conditions of uncertainty, it would be highly unrealistic to assume that JHU will command a fixed 12%.no matter what the circumstances are

There is further confusion when he says that JHU and UPFA will have a combined strength of 111 ie 17 + 94. Even if by any stretch of imagination the two parties combine, they are close to the required 113 seats to form a government but they can not unless they pinch two seats from either SLMC, UNP or TNA. Even if this is possible, can JHU toe the line with either of these and will their own supporters endorse such a stand.

Alternatively, SLMC, UNP, TNA will have a combined strength of 225 - 111 or 114 a strength that satisfies the controlling power.In other words, the writer, by his own statistics, has proved a point which I have been saying over and over again that the entry of the sangha in to the political arena can create a situation which will recall to life an ailing party.

His assumption that JHU will erode the vote bank of UNF and UPFA in equal proportion at 6% each is another glaring baselessassumption. My position is that all those who vote for JHU are anti LTTE and would have otherwise voted for UPFA.

There are other qualitative factors that needs due recognition before passing judgement. The article under reference points out as follows.

Therefore , the strategy of UPFA should be, to come to an agreement with JHU to join together after the elections, instead of slandering the maha sangha.

May I ask why AFTER elections and not BEFORE elections. Why invite danger? I would also like to reword his statement from my point of view and substituting BEFORE for AFTER.

Therefore, the strategy of JHU should be to come to an agreement with UPFA to join together BEFORE the elections.

The question of slandering, even if it does exist, will not therefore arise.

Dire Consequences When monastics go politics

Mahinda Attanayake

I would like to share my observations on possible outcomes at the coming elections. I hope it will give you at least a foundation to base your arguments and counter arguments against JHU. However, this should not be treated as a reflection of the final results of the election 2004 as the assumptions can vary and may not be accurate. It will give a you an idea about the possible scenarios and the readers' own experiences can be adopted to "fine tune" the results.

For the purpose of this analysis the observations are based on following assumptions.
· No. of voters in 2004 are same as in 2001.
· All people voted for JVP and PA in 2001 will vote for UPFA in 2004.
· All people voted for UNP in 2001 will vote for UNP in 2004.
· JHU will get 12% of votes in all districts except in the North and East.
· JHU will extract equal no. of votes from UNP and from UPFA.
· JHU will not win a single seat in Northern and Eastern provinces.
· Votes of a party or a group which received less than 5% of votes in a district will not be counted for calculations for allocation of seats.

Two scenarios, i.e. without JHU and with JHU, have been worked out.
An example is :
Galle District. (10 seats)
(A) Results in 2001
UNP - 238989 - 5seats
PA- 232931 - 4 Seats
JVP - 61806- 1 seat
TOTAL - 533726

(B) Projected Results in 2004, as per above assumptions, but without JHU.
UNP - 238989 - 4 seats
UPFA - 294737 - 6 seats
TOTAL - 533726
( C) Projected Results in 2004, as per the above assumptions, with JHU.
UNP - 206965 - 4 seats
UPFA - 262713 - 5 seats
JHU - 64048 - 1 seat
TOTAL - 533726

In essence, If JHU did not contest, UPFA will get 6 seats. Due to JHU intervention, UPFA lost one seat to JHU. UNP seats have not been affected.
However, in some other districts same logic has affected the seats of UNP too. Take Kandy as an example.

Kandy District (12 seats)
(A) Results in 2001
UNP - 314297 - 7seats
PA- 233637 - 4 Seats
JVP - 37146- 1 seat
TOTAL - 585080

(B) Projected Results in 2004, as per above assumptions, but without JHU.
UNP - 314297 - 7 seats
UPFA - 270783 - 5 seats
TOTAL - 585080
( C) Projected Results in 2004, as per the above assumptions, with JHU.
UNP - 279192 - 6 seats
UPFA - 235678 - 5 seats
JHU - 70210 - 1 seat
TOTAL - 585080

So, in Kandy in contrast to Galle, JHU has won one seat at the expense of UNP.
When all seats in all 22 electoral districts are reviewed as per the above calculations and assumptions, the final results line-up is as follows.
2004 without JHU
UNP - 93,
UPFA- 104,
TNA- 23,
SLMC- 5,
Total - 225
2004 with JHU
UNP - 86,
UPFA - 94,
JHU - 17,
TNA -23,
SLMC - 5,
Total - 225

According to this results , it is noted that UPFA cannot form a government even if JHU did not come into fray. They have to get another 9 seats. Even after joining with SLMC they cannot get that number of seats. Only possibility is to get the support of the TNA. To win additional 9 seats on their own, UPFA should increase its vote bank from average 50-55% to around 60 - 62% pushing UNP down to 40 - 38. ( Please note that even just after the assassination of Gamini Dissanayake , virtually without any challenge from UNP, PA managed only 62%, which is the highest percentage in recent history.) It should be noted that to increase one seat in a district, the leading party has to increase their vote share by a large percentage. Again, if we take the example of Galle District, for UPFA to get 7 seats instead of 6, they should receive at least 327000 votes out of 533726 or 61% of the votes. Unless they have a similar trend around the country it is not possible to expect 9 more seats on their own.

However, the interesting point is that with JHU, UPFA has a partner with a combined strength of 111 (UPFA - 94 + JHU 17) which is very close to the required 113 seats, to form a government with out minority parties. Although JHU has extracted 10 seats from UPFA, it has also taken 7 seats from UNP too. UPFA on its own will not be able to get that 7 from UNP unless it increase its vote share to about 60 %. In other words although JHU took 10 seats out of UPFA, it can come back with 17 seats.

That type of agreement between JHU and UPFA will be acceptable to Sinhala Buddhist masses too, as it has a control mechanism in it. CBK cannot do what ever she wants if the JHU has the "King Making" power. They will be a separate entity and can withdraw their support to the government when ever they feel. Patriotic forces in UPFA do not have that ability. We can see PNM has already been swallowed by the Sandhanaya(UPFA). Where is the controlling mechanism over CBK?. What leverage PNM has now in controlling CBK. If patriotic Sinhalese blindly follow the Sandhanaya (UPFA), they will be fooled by our political parties once again as it happened several times in the past. Not only PNM, even JVP will loose its controlling power after the elections.

Therefore , the strategy of UPFA should be, to come to an agreement with JHU to join together after the elections, instead of slandering the maha sangha. This strategy will not work if JHU decided to join UPFA before the elections. JHU is the party capable of extracting votes from UNP, not UPFA. UPFA supporters should realise that reality and treat maha sangha with due respect for that ability.

If not, we can see how the leaders of both sides of the political divide in Sri Lanka go behind Maha Sangha with "atapirikaras" on 3rd April 2004. It is better for the both worlds to do it now! By appointing a commission to inquire and report on the passing away of Ven. Gangodavila Soma thero, the president has indicated that she has understood that reality.