Wednesday, 25 September 2013 00:00
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ELECTIONS in Sri Lanka have to endure some hard punches, as was demonstrated over the weekend. Commonwealth and SAARC monitors who were in the country have highlighted serious blows to democracy, especially in the north, and emphasised on the need to improve the powers of the Polls Chief if real progress is to be made.
Excessive use of the military including possible involvement on voter intimidation and attack on a female candidate, unethical campaigning promoting development projects headed by none other than the Head of State, assault of two monitors, massive abuse of public resources, undermining of the legal framework by the 18th Amendment, limited powers to the Elections Commission, misleading usage of media’s the list is long and painful.
However, as reported by the Daily FT, the Observer Mission from five Commonwealth Member states also hailed the determination and resilience of voters to exercise their franchise in the context of a compromised electoral environment.
Issuing its preliminary report of findings following Saturday’s Northern Provincial Council elections, the Commonwealth Election Observer Mission to Sri Lanka said elections were a process and not an event and noted persistent reports of overt military support for particular candidates, reported cases of the military actually campaigning for selected candidates, and military involvement in the intimidation of the electorate, party supporters and candidates.
“The role of the military in the electoral campaign was consistently described to the mission as a significant obstacle to a credible electoral process,” the preliminary findings by the Mission claim placing a huge weight of responsibility on the Government.
While lauding the efforts of the Elections Commissioner and polls officials, the Commonwealth Mission said it had received reports that several media outlets were self-censoring sensitive reporting on the elections and noted that in the run up to elections and on Election Day important online and electronic media sources were inaccessible.
The Commonwealth Mission said the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, enacted in 2010, had undermined the constitutional and legal framework for a credible and competitive election, particularly the provision for an independent Electoral Commission has been negated.
The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) echoed these sentiments with former Indian Chief Commissioner of Elections N. Gopalswami, who headed the monitoring group, calling for the Election Commissioner to be empowered, insisting that such overarching authority is the best hope for genuinely free and fair elections. Also cited among the Mission’s negative observations was the misuse of Government staff in campaign work including trainee nurses and Samurdhi officials.
As the host of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) the government should have extra motivation to promote credible elections. Yet disappointingly the most powerful mouthpieces of the Government have focused on branding the Tamil community as “ungrateful”and “forgetful” preferring to praise the Sinhalese in the south for “doing the right thing” by voting them back in power with no attention being given to the deep issues that were left unaddressed by the Government since the end of the war.
This sort of misguided rhetoric can seriously damage the already tenuous relationship between the two communities, further polarising them and strengthening the foundation for future conflict, but for the power hungry these are nominal concerns.
