COLOMBO,Aug 03,2020: Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa hopes to tighten his hold on the nation’s fractious politics in an election on Wednesday that could elevate his brother and allow the two to change the constitution if they prevail.
Rajapaksa, who claims credit for controlling the spread of the new coronavirus in the island nation, hopes to install his elder brother and former president – current caretaker Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa – in the post formally with an outright election victory.
The opposition candidate is the son of Ranasinghe Premadasa, who was assassinated while president by a Tamil suicide bomber in 1993.
Voters in the tiny Indian Ocean nation of 21 million people will wear masks, carry their own pens to mark ballot papers and maintain physical distancing for the parliamentary polling that has twice been postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Votes will be counted on Thursday.
The Rajapaksas want to return to the presidency powers that were diluted by previous governments as part of reforms to prevent abuses of power.
The reforms created independent bodies, including judicial, human rights and police commissions to exercise powers that had been concentrated in the president.
President Rajapaksa says he cannot implement his agenda of economic growth because of the curbs on his power.
Restoring those powers would require amending the constitution, which in turn requires a two-thirds majority in parliament.
