Provincial vote is seen as a test for Sri Lanka’s President: Nytimes

Voters in a southeastern Sri Lankan province headed to the polls on Saturday in what is widely seen as a crucial test of whether President Mahinda Rajapaksa is likely to win a third term in the coming months.

The candidates for chief minister of Uva Province are seen as proxies for the coming battle for the presidency. Shashendra Rajapaksa, son of the speaker of Parliament and a nephew of the president, is the chief ministerial candidate from the dominant Sri Lanka Freedom Party. Harin Fernando, a charismatic leader of the United National Party, resigned his seat in Parliament to oppose him.

Both sides held huge rallies in the days leading up to Thursday, when a 48-hour ban on politicking went into effect. In rallies in the towns of Mahiyangana and Wellawaya, President Rajapaksa emphasized that his government had defeated the Tamil Tigers, a brutal insurgency group, in 2009.

Uva is widely seen as a bastion of support for the governing party, which won 72 percent of the vote in the 2009 provincial elections and secured 25 of 34 seats in the Provincial Assembly.

But the final rallies of the United National Party were packed, giving the opposition considerable hope. In the mountainous towns of Bandarawela and Badulla, the provincial capital, women and children huddled in the cold until well past midnight to cheer opposition politicians. The green banners of the United National Party fluttered throughout major district towns.

“The tide has turned,” Mr. Fernando said in an interview.

Rajpal Abeynayake, editor in chief of the government-owned Daily News, the country’s largest newspaper, predicted an easy victory for the governing party. And he said in an interview that the results would demonstrate that Mr. Rajapaksa was headed for a commanding re-election victory later this year or early next year, when the next presidential election is expected to be called.

“The people here will vote for the leader they think is best for the country, not the person The New York Times and other foreign media think is best,” Mr. Abeynayake said.

Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, executive director of the Colombo-based Centre for Policy Alternatives, a nonprofit think tank, said that even a narrow loss would embolden the opposition since it would suggest that the Rajapaksas’ popularity is waning.

President Rajapaksa’s victory in the civil war made him hugely popular in the immediate aftermath of the fighting, but it is unclear whether voters are happy with his stewardship of the country since the war’s end. Sri Lanka has received considerable investment from China while facing growing pressure from Western governments to improve its postwar reconciliation efforts. - New York Times