LG Election 2018: Voters Gave the Village to Mahinda for 17 Years, the Nation to Sirisena Alliance for 5 Years
Posted on February 12th, 2018
It is important to decipher the signals of the LG election 2018 correctly without bias. The king (voter) has spoken. But the arrogant king doesn’t repeat! If his signal is interpreted wrongly, there will be dire consequences for (public) servants. Readers must calmly analyze the outcome without hatred or favour.
Although voters gave a clear win for Mahinda’s SLPP, they deliberately avoided giving SLPP 50%. In fact, Mahinda’s party received 2% less votes than January 2015 when he was replaced by Sirisena. Put it differently, the Sirisena Alliance (DNA, Swan) retained its 6.2 million votes while Mahinda lost 700,000 votes from his 5.8 million.
It means the voter gave the village to Mahinda for another 5 years and at the same time gave the Sirisena alliance another 2 years to work together. Mahinda has been winning the village since 2006 and with this extension his continuing reign over the village goes on for 17 years (until 2023). Sirisena has already spent 3 years and with this extension for his alliance, he can legally and morally stay on for another 2 years.
JVP has dramatically improved their national standing for its small size from August 2015 and TNA has also increased their share within the Swan Alliance. UNP has suffered since August 2015. SLFP managed to hang in there. SLPP will be elated with their performance. All parties are now looking forward for the provincial council election.
Voters want the DNA alliance to keep pursuing the corrupt and punish them. This is particularly true about JVP and SLFP voters making up 20%. They are the kingmakers of any national election. Sirisena must recognize at least now that he cannot rely on Ranil and Sagala to deliver FCID goods. He must hand over the function to a competent minister or do it himself. Sirisena must realize that he would be sitting on a vote base of 56% had he punished the culprits by now. SLPP and UNP owners must not think voters delivered justice. Voters have no intention of messing with the courts system. They cannot do so even if they wished.
While the village needs Mahinda policies and the nation Sirisena policies (according to voters), they also want the two policies to work together. Hope politicians of all sides hear this loud and clear. Next stop PC elections followed by national elections.
February 12th, 2018 at 7:17 am
Dilrook
Mahinda’s party received 2% less votes than January 2015. That is possible taking into account he has not put candidates for Tamil and Muslim areas and naturally this is a local government election. Certain candidates will have preferential votes over the others and historically government has upper hand.
February 12th, 2018 at 9:15 am
What about the votes for the independent groups that supported the SLPP? Have you taken them into your equation?
However I do agree that SLPP should try to get all other support that is possible for the presidential election, the UNP is the enemy to beat. Even supporting MS until 2019 with an agreement SLFP will support SLPP president candidate (MS will not re contest) & support SLPP at the general election should be considered. You cannot underestimate the evil forces who will organize block Tamil,Muslim & Catholic votes to UNP, the SLPP should muster all other votes as much as possible. Even an alliance with the JVP should be considered. As you say here, not the heart, the brain should work.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:00 pm
@Neela
He did put forward candidates for Tamil and Muslim areas either through SLPP or other (TMVP, independent), etc. The total includes them. He has nothing much to gain or lose there anyway! The Swan Alliance on the other hand increased their percentage by 2%. In other words, the gap between Mahinda and Sirisena increased by about 4%. It comes mainly from Sinhala areas.
In comparison, in 2011 Mahinda’s UPFA won 56% of the vote island-wide in the same election (with a few small exceptions). Yes; historically the ruling party had the upper hand in LG election but it ended this year.
@Charithsls
The total is after adding those. For instance, Maharagama Independent Group. I agree an alliance with the JVP is a must. JVP votes percentage increased. It keeps rising. These are mostly Sinhala Buddhist votes. Trying to win Tamil and Muslim votes will only erode SLPP’s Sinhala votes. This is what happened from 2010 to 2015.
February 12th, 2018 at 2:29 pm
Dilrook,
”
The Village wants Mahinda policies and the Nation wants Sirisena policies, you say?
Poppycock, I say!
In this election, VOTERS voted NOT out of Local Governmental Concerns, but out of CONCERN for the SAFETY OF THE NATION as a whole.
They were CONCERNED with all of the Anti-National Policies and Activities of the Yamapalanaya, and they VOTED for Mahinda because he is a PROVEN PATRITIC LEADER who has DEMONSTRATED by his ACTIONS that he will DEFEND, PROTECT and DEVELOP the Nation as a WHOLE!
I REPEAT, the VOTERS voted for Mahinda and the SLPP NOT out of Local Governmental Concerns, but out of CONCERN for the SAFETY OF THE NATION as a whole.
How can you be SO WRONG?
February 12th, 2018 at 2:36 pm
JVP may become more normalized as they realised ( Bandarawela) joining with mainstream ordinary citizens could increase their votes dramatically. I beleie it was soem sort of experiment at Bandarawela.
February 12th, 2018 at 5:19 pm
@Ananda
I agree national issues were used in the election campaign but it is a LG election after all. Mahinda also aired similar views brushing aside PM rumours.
Tying SLPP victory (less than 46%) to prove or disaprove current national issues is very dangerous. If so, 53% of the people approved current UNP-SLFP-TNA-JVP policies!
When aggregating, a distinction must be made between current policies of parties in the Swan Alliance and policies presented before 2015 by it that won the election.
Current national policies are not the ones that galvanized the DNA (Swan) party. Instead it was mainly punishing the corrupt, law and order, end to what they claimed civilian killings, etc. This is what won again. UNP-SLFP-JVP-TNA are in complete agreement on these. And they have a huge lead over SLPP on this. These policies must continue as per the people’s renewed mandate.
On all others like new constitution, ETCA, etc. the constituent parties of the Swan Alliance do not agree. Therefore, you cannot aggregate their votes on these policies. Not going ahead with these is what the voters told the government.
February 12th, 2018 at 6:44 pm
I totally agree with Ananda-USA. Dilrook Kannangara’s 100% biased analysis ignores the fact that not only the village but the whole nation (NB: The ‘Nation’ comprises those citizens who prioritise the country over race or ethnicity; as far as I know most Sinhalese and a few others do this) are now demanding a Mahinda return. Nationalists have voted for the pohottuwa.
February 12th, 2018 at 7:40 pm
Good analysis but better to look at it in two different ways.
1. Similar to what writer thought correct, 20% voters voted for REAL good governance (not Yahapalanaya). These are the people truly love the country despite political differences and preferences. Otherwise who wants to vote Sirisena, the back stabber- I don’t believe he has even 2% faithful followers (similar to Mahind’s 45%) ? Who want’s vote Wijeweera the man who instigated so much violence ? Whether they are fooled by Sirisena and Anura or not, they have no hidden desires they are still hoping for a good governement.
2. People who voted Mahinda in 2015 have no reason not to vote him this time around. Surely they have faithfully supported him. This government cannot be worse than how it is now. So how is it that Pohottuwa won majority at village level but UNP won more seats in 2015 ? It is because of that 20% who voted for UNP hoping for a good governement now fed up and voted Sirisena and JVP.
Whoever governs should stop hurting the country now and move on to serve people instead. Surely they have earned enough for a generation.
February 12th, 2018 at 9:35 pm
BREAKING NEWS, NEWS, NEWS!
Many members of the UPFA elected to various Local Government entities around the country HAVE EXPRESSED SUPPORT for the SLPP.
As such, the total number of Local Government Entities controlled by the SLPP has INCREASED from the ORIGINAL 231 to 239 at the last count reported on TV news.
No doubt, many more will join the SLPP in the near future! The post-election FENCE JUMPING has begun in EARNEST and will only ACCELERATE!
JAYAWEWA …. Pohottuwa!
February 12th, 2018 at 10:07 pm
Regarding the matter that Dilroo Kannangara raises, readers may also check out the following link.
https://www.mahinda.info/2018/02/hansa-sandanaya-scream/
February 12th, 2018 at 11:51 pm
I have translated the first part of the article published in the website given above:
එජාප මැතිවරණ පරාජයේ පශ්චාත් මරණ පරීක්ෂණය පවත්වන එජාප මරණ පරීක්ෂකවරුන් විසින් අපූරු සොයාගැනීමක් කරගෙන තිබේ. ඔවුන් පවසන්නේ මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ මැතිතුමන්ගේ ඡන්ද ප්රතිශතය 2015 ජනාධිපතිවරණයට සාපේක්ෂව අඩු වී ඇති බවත්, මෛත්රීපාල+එජාප+ජවිපෙ එකතු ව ඉල්ලුවානම් එය එදා 2015 ජනාධිපතිවරණයේ ප්රතිශතයට වඩා වැඩි බවත් ය. නමුත් මෙම තර්කය පදනම් විරහිත පට්ට පල් කෙප්පයකි. ඊට හේතු පහතින්.
[1]. 2015 ජනාධිපතිවරණයේදී හංස සධානය ඡන්දය ඉල්ලුවේ එකම ප්රතිපත්තියක් ජනතාව වෙත ඉදිරිපත් කරමිනි. ඔවුන් එකිනෙකා විවේචනය කර ගත්තේ නැත. ඒ අනුව ඔවුන් එකම දේශපාලන ප්රවාහයක් ලෙස සලකා ජනතාව ඡන්දය දෙන ලදී.
එනමුත් මෙවර එජාපෙත්, මෛත්රීපාලත්, ජවිපෙත් වෙන වෙනම ඡන්දය ඉල්ලන ලදී. ඔවුන් එකිනෙකා බරපතල ලෙස විවේචනය කර ගත් බව ඔවුන්ගේ මැතිවරණ කතා දෙස බැලීමෙන් ඔබට පැහැදිළි වේ. මේ සියලුම දෙනා පොහොට්ටුව විවේචනය කරන අතරේ, මෛත්රීපාල පැවසූයේ එජාපය හොරු බවයි. එජාප හොරුන්ට පාඩමක් ඉගැන්වීමට තම පක්ෂයට ඡන්දය දෙන ලෙස ඉල්ලුවෝ ය. එජාපය පැවසූයේ මෛත්රීපාල ගාව සිටින්නේ හොරු බවයි. තනි එජාප ආණ්ඩුවක් පිහිටවීමට එජාපය ඡන්දය ඉල්ලුවෝ ය. ජවිපෙ කිව්වේ ඒ දෙගොල්ලොම හොරු බවයි.
ඒ අනුව එජාපෙ කෙරෙහි කළ කිරුණ එජාප පාක්ෂිකයන් මෛත්රීපාලට හෝ ජවිපෙට ඡන්දය දෙන්නට ඇත. නමුත් ඔවුන් එකතුව ආවානම් ඒ කාටවත් ඔවුන් ඡන්දය නොදී ගෙදර සිටිනු ඇත. එලෙස වෙන් වෙන්ව පොරොන්දු සහ සටන් පාථ කියමින් තරග වැදුණ පක්ෂ වල ඡන්දය එකතු කර පෙන්වීම තරම් මෝඩ වැඩක් ලොවෙත් නැත.
මෙය උදාහරණයකින් කිවහොත්, ශ්රී ලංකාව, එංගලන්තය සහ අයර්ලන්තය සහ ඕස්ට්රේලියාව ක්රිකට් තරගාවලියක් පවත්වා ශ්රී ලංකාව ජයග්රහණය කළා යැයි සිතමු. එවිට “ශ්රී ලංකාව දින්නට වැඩක් නෑ. සුදු ජාතිකයන්ගේ රටවල් වන අපේ රටවල් වල ලකුණු එකතු කළොත් ශ්රී ලංකාව උඩින්ම පරාදයි” කියා ඒ රටවල් කිවහොත්,,, අන්න ඒ වගේම මෝඩ කතාවකි මේ එජාපේ සමහරුන් කියන්නේ. අතනදී ඒ රටවල් එකම ටීම් එකකින් ආ යුතුයි වගේම, මෙතනදීත් හංස සංධානය තනි පක්ෂයකින් ආවොත් මිස වෙන් වෙන්ව ඉල්ලා අපි වැඩියි කීම ජාත්යන්තර විහිලුවකි.
Reply to those who argue that Mahinda would have been defeated if Maithripala, the UNP and the JVP contested him jointly:
The UNP coroners who are holding a postmortem on their party’s defeat have made a strange discovery: They say that the percentage of votes polled by Hon. Mahinda Rajapaksa has diminished relative to what he secured in 2015, and that if Maithripala, UNP and JVP contested as a combined force they could have got a higher percentage of votes than they did in 2015. But this argument is a baseless lie. A few reasons are given below.
(1) The Swan alliance fought the elections on a single platform. They did not criticize each other. Therefore people voted for them as a single political group.
But, this time around, Maithripala and the JVP contested the election separately. Election speeches reveal that they criticized each other. While all of them attacked the Pohottuwa (i.e., the SLPP), Maithripala charged that the UNPers were thieves. The Maithripala faction urged the voters to vote for his party to teach the UNP thieves a lesson. The UNP’s counter argument was that those who were with Maithripala were the thieves. Therefore they asked the voters to vote for the UNP to form a pure UNP government. The JVP’s criticism was that both those parties were rogues.
Therefore UNP supporters who were disappointed of their party might have voted for Maithripala or the JVP. But if they came as a single group the UNP voters would have refrained from voting. It is extremely foolish to add together the votes of competing parties that made conflicting election pledges and uttered separate slogans. To illustrate this, let’s imagine that in a cricket tournament between Sri Lanka, England, Ireland and Australia, Sri Lanka won. If it was argued by the other (losing) countries that Sri Lanka’s win was meaningless because when the scores of the White countries were added, then Sri Lanka would have been easily beaten. Such an argument will be considered foolish. Some UNPers are making that stupid argument. In the case of cricketing analogy, the argument would have been valid if those three countries played against Sri Lanka as a single team. Likewise here the same argument would not hold water unless the Swan alliance contested the elections as a single front. To do otherwise is an international joke.
February 13th, 2018 at 2:25 am
@Vaisrawana
That is obviously not the case. SLPP total votes are 5.1 million. Swan Alliance 5.8 million.
“http://www.ft.lk/columns/Had-Mahinda-Rajapaksa-run-for–president-on-10-Feb–he-would-have-lost/4-649296”
Its best to understand these numbers are move forward than get misled with false sense of confidence.
February 13th, 2018 at 6:11 pm
@Dilrook
The fact is that the constituent members of the Swan alliance were fighting against each other (or fighting among themselves) this time. So you can’t add up the votes they got separately and say the SLPP has polled fewer votes than they. Remember the Swan alliance is not there now. It’s only a useful delusion now (useful for the yahapalanaya to hoodwink the international community). If, by any chance the UNP, the SLFP (M) and the JVP fought this election as a single alliance, they would have collectively got far fewer votes than they did separately. The analogy of the cricket match above deserves some more of your attention.
February 13th, 2018 at 7:57 pm
If you have been watching the News Channels, there is a beehive of ACTIVITY within the SLFP and UNP parts of the Yamapalanaya, ALL geared to AVOIDING stepping aside for the SLPP as the VOTERS want, and to form a CARETAKER Govt until a General Election can be held.
So, lets look at the existing situation to UNDERSTAND WHY:
1. MR has said he does not the post of PM offered by MS without the mandate of a New General Election
2. UNP wants to create a UNP-ONLY government but is short of 7 MPs to get the required 50% majority in Parliament
3. JVP has REFUSED to join a UNP-led or JO-led Govt
4. MS has said he will not accept as Ministers any SLFP/UPFA individuals who join an ONLY-UNP-led Government
5. The TNA with its16 MPs is remaining non-committal until requested by some major Party to be the kingmaker.
The Party composition of MPs in the current Parliament is as follows:
UNP 106
JO 52
UPFA/SLFP 43
TNA 16
JVP 6
EPDP 1
SLMC 1
TOTAL 225
Without ministerial portfolios no UPFA/SLFP-ers will join ANY Govt, because MS refuses to accept them as Ministers.
So, the ONLY WAY the UNP can reach the required number of 113 MPs is to form an ALLIANCE with the TNA!
However, that will be DEATH for the UNP in future Elections because Sinhala people will see that as the ULTIMATE TREACHERY and CULMINATION of Yamapalana efforts to Federalize Sri Lanka through a New Constitution.
The JO cannot form a Govt with 113 MPs, because JO(52)+UPFA(43)+EPDP(1)+SLMC(1) seats add up to only 97 seats.
That may be why SLPP/MR wants a New General Election to win a sufficient number of Parliamentary seats without accepting, even if were possible, the JVP and the TNA as allies.
February 13th, 2018 at 8:55 pm
Meanwhile, the Instability of the Yamapalanaya post Local Govt Election has drawn the attention of the US and Indian Govts.
It has been reported that the US and Indian Ambassadors have met with President Sirisena, and have ADVISED HIM to CONTINUE the Yamapalana Govt and its political program, NO DOUBT for the BENEFIT of their countries!!
Now, it appears that post-election politics of Sri Lanka have been INTERNATIONALIZED!
Also, it has been reported that Subramaniam Swamy, former Cabinet Minister of India, has RECOMMENDED that ex-President Mahinda Rajapaksa be again allowed to become the President of Sri Lanka!
We STABBED OURSELVES in the BELLY sometime ago and BLOCKED that particular route to SALVATION!