2029 Sri Lankan presidential election

2029 Sri Lankan presidential election

21 July – 21 August 2029 (presumptive)

Nominee Anura Kumara Dissanayake Sajith Premadasa Party JVP SJB Alliance NPP SJB

President before election Anura Kumara Dissanayake NPP Elected President TBD

The 2029 Sri Lankan presidential election will be the tenth presidential election in the country's history and is scheduled to be held between 21 July – 21 August 2029. Elections may be held earlier under exceptional circumstances if the incumbent president, after completing four years of his first term, issues a proclamation requesting a fresh mandate from the electorate to seek a second term.

Background

The 2024 Sri Lankan presidential election was a three-way contest between Ranil Wickremesinghe, Sajith Premadasa, and Anura Kumara Dissanayake. In the first vote count, no candidate secured a majority. Dissanayake led with 42.31% of the vote, followed by Premadasa with 32.76%, while incumbent president Wickremesinghe finished third with 17.27%. As no candidate achieved a majority, a second round of vote counting was held for the first time in Sri Lanka's history under its limited ranked voting system. At the conclusion of this preferential vote count, Dissanayake was declared the winner, securing 55.89% of the vote. He was inaugurated on 23 September 2024.

During the 2024 presidential election campaign, both Dissanayake and Premadasa declared that, if elected, they would abolish the executive presidential system and restore the country to a parliamentary democracy. This familiar pre-election pledge has been made by many political leaders in the past, yet none have fulfilled it.

On 23 September 2024, National People's Power member and former parliamentarian Sunil Handunnetti informed the media that abolishing the executive presidency remains a priority for a government led by newly elected President Anura Kumara Dissanayake. He further stated that the country has elected its last executive president and that there will be no more presidential elections in the future.

Electoral system

See also: List of presidential elections in Sri Lanka

Type of electoral system

According to Article 30 of the Constitution of Sri Lanka, the President of Sri Lanka is elected for a five-year term. Article 31 states that a person who has been elected president twice is ineligible to contest for a third term due to term limits.

The article also specifies that the presidential election must be held no less than one month and no more than two months before the incumbent president's term expires.

However, if the incumbent president wishes to seek a fresh mandate and a second term, they may issue a proclamation calling for early elections. This can be done any time after completing four years of their first term. By doing so, the president requests a new election before the full five-year term is completed, allowing the electorate to decide whether the president should continue for a second term.

The president is elected through a system of limited ranked voting. Voters can express up to three ranked preferences for the presidency. If no candidate receives more than 50% of all valid votes in the first count, all candidates except the two who received the highest number of votes are eliminated. The second and third preference votes of the eliminated candidates are then redistributed to the remaining two candidates until one of them secures an outright majority.

This system remained unused until 2024. Since the first presidential election in 1982, a candidate from one of the major parties or alliances consistently secured an outright majority in the first count.

External links

• Election Commission of Sri Lanka official website
• Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption official website