Marxist Dissanayake wins presidential election in Sri Lanka

Marxist lawmaker Anura Kumara Dissanayake has won Sri Lanka's presidential election, according to data released by the Election Commission on Sunday, as voters rejected the old political guard widely accused of driving the South Asian country into economic ruin.

Dissanayake, who was popular with the youth thanks to his pro-worker, anti-political elite campaign, secured victory over opposition leader Sajith Premadasa and incumbent liberal President Ranil Wickremesinghe, who took over the country two years ago after the economy hit rock bottom.

According to Election Commission data, Dissanayake received 5,740,179 votes, followed by Premadasa with 4,530,902.

The elections held on Saturday were crucial for the country as it tries to recover from the worst economic crisis in its history and the resulting political upheaval.

“This success is not the result of the work of one person, but of the collective effort of hundreds of thousands of you. Your dedication has brought us this far and for that I am deeply grateful. This victory belongs to all of us,” Dissanayake said in a post on X.

Dissanayake, 55, leads the left-wing National People Power coalition, an alliance of civil society groups, experts, Buddhist clerics and students.

The election was effectively a referendum on Wickremesinghe's leadership of a fragile recovery that includes restructuring Sri Lanka's debt under an International Monetary Fund bailout program after the country defaults in 2022.

Dissanayake had announced that he would renegotiate the IMF deal to make the austerity measures more bearable. Wickremesinghe had warned that any change in the fundamentals of the agreement could delay the release of a fourth tranche of nearly $3 billion, which is crucial to maintaining stability.

None of the candidates received more than 50% of the vote. Under Sri Lanka's electoral system, which allows voters to select three candidates in order of preference, the top two candidates are retained and the ballots of eliminated candidates are checked for preferences granted to either of the top two candidates. The candidate with the highest number of votes is declared the winner.

This was a strong result for Dissanayake, who received just over 3% of the vote in a previous presidential election in 2019, and suggests that voters are tired of the old political guard.

Wickremesinghe's Foreign Minister Ali Sabry congratulated Dissanayake and expressed the hope that he would “follow his path with a commitment to transparency, integrity and the long-term welfare of the country.”

The government announced on Thursday that it had cleared the final hurdle of debt restructuring by reaching an agreement in principle with private bondholders. At the time of the default, Sri Lanka's domestic and external debt totaled $83 billion. The government says it has now restructured over $17 billion.

Despite a significant improvement in key economic indicators, people in Sri Lanka are struggling with high taxes and living costs.

Sri Lanka's economic crisis resulted largely from excessive borrowing for projects that did not generate revenue. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the government's insistence on using scarce foreign exchange reserves to support the rupee currency contributed to the economy's free fall.

The economic collapse led to severe shortages of essential goods such as medicines, food, cooking gas and fuel. People stood in line for days to get these items. Riots broke out, with protesters occupying key buildings, including the President's house, his office and the Prime Minister's office. The then President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was forced to flee the country and resign.

Wickremesinghe was elected by a parliamentary vote in July 2022 to serve the remainder of Rajapaksa's five-year term.

Francis and Saaliq write for the Associated Press.