Ranil Wickramasinghe has won the election held in the Parliament to elect a new President.
Votes were received as follows.
Ranil Wickramasinghe – 134
Dallas Alahapperuma – 82
Anura Dissanayake – 3
Two MPs abstained from voting and 4 of the votes cast were cancelled.
Parliamentary Secretary General Dhammika Dissanayake stated that 4 of the votes cast in the polling held in Parliament today (20) were invalid votes.
Accordingly, the number of valid votes is 219 and a candidate needs to get 110 votes to win.
The distinctive people-centered culture at Ansell Lanka, part of a world leader in providing superior health and safety protection solutions that enhance human wellbeing, is now recognized with the Great Place to Work Certification™ awarded by the global authority of workplace culture.
Based on the Trust Index survey by the Great Place to Work Institute followed by a comprehensive and holistic culture brief, over 85pct of employees scored to various positive statements. This milestone goes onto prove Ansell Lanka’s passion and drive to create engaging employee experiences.
Employees at Ansell Lanka are the torchbearers of its global values namely integrity, agility, passion, teamwork, trustworthiness, creativity, involvement and excellence which are deeply rooted and embedded into its culture. Such values are actively reinstated through highly effective activities and programs, including when onboarding and transiting new employees.
Ansell Lanka believes in actively listening to its employees and always stand by them. ‘Ansell Ape’ was established to ensure and encourage employees have a voice in taking up all their concerns, with stringent policies for zero tolerance on harassment and discrimination. Very recently, Ansell Lanka also launched various themes and messages to further enhance understanding on Diversity, Equity and Inclusivity (DEI) practices, namely for different thinking styles, gender diversity, generations in the workplace, race and ethnicity, persons with mobility issues, and women leadership.
Innovation, knowledge sharing, and groundbreaking thinking is a continuous routine at Ansell Lanka. Its employees have consecutively won numerous awards at Ansell’s Innovation Awards, and everyone is included in developing ideas and problem-solving solutions including embracing the Kaizen philosophy and awards for continuous improvements, waste minimization and lean discipline at the floor level.
Some of the benefits at Ansell Lanka include career growth and learning opportunities one could expect from a truly global company, production incentives, monetary rewards for spot recognitions for ideas generated, distress fund, library facilities, extracurricular sporting activities and spacious in-house gym facilities, among others. Employees can access the newly established 24/7 Medical Center inhouse with well trained nursing staff and a qualified doctor.
An Employee Day is held annually with the view of celebrating their contribution including a Family Day to rejoice with their families at our workplace every other year. Ansell Lanka engages with the local communities across the country, and has an annual Scholarship Awards program for employees’ children, who have gained University entrance and those who have been successful at the Year 5 scholarship examination. There is also a program held once every nine months to create awareness for expectant female employees.
COVID-19 is a continued health and safety priority at Ansell. Its organization wide ‘Back to Better’ program includes webinars on topics such as managing burnout, self-care when remote working, resiliency, physical and mental health tips, and posting employee mental health updates and recourses. Managers are also encouraged to have open conversations about mental health and wellbeing.
The voting in Parliament to elect a new President has now ended.
Accordingly, the counting of votes has started.
Harin Fernando for Ranil Wickramasinghe, Dylan Perera for Dallas Alahapperuma and Vijitha Herath for Anura Kumara Dissanayake have participated in monitoring the counting of votes.
Selvaraja Gajendran and GG Ponnambalam abstained from voting in this poll.
The voting in the Parliament to elect a new President has now started.
This is the first time in the history that such a poll is being held in the Parliament of Sri Lanka for the appointment of a successor president.
Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena says that there are provisions in the constitution to ban parliament for 7 years if anyone tries to get photos of the ballot paper used to elect the president.
He mentioned this while starting the parliamentary proceedings today and informing the MPs about the voting process.
The speaker requested the MPs to hand over the mobile phone they have at the time of marking the vote to the concerned officials as no member of parliament can take his mobile phone to the polling place and if anyone has their mobile phone, two special officials will be kept to hand it over.
The General Secretary of the Parliament is acting as the Electoral Officer of this poll and he is currently informing the MPs about how the poll will be conducted.
The parliamentary session has started for the voting to elect a new president.
Tissa Attanayake, Member of Parliament of the Samagi Jana Balavegaya, says that Dallas Alahapperuma has a clear majority by now and that he will definitely win in today’s presidential elections.
Attanayake mentioned that the people are waiting for a change and that change can only be achieved through Sajith-Dallas unity.
Although the Sri Lanka Freedom Party has officially declared its support for Dallas Alahapperuma, 9 of its 14 MPs are ready to support Ranil Wickramasinghe, said Chamara Sampath Dasanayake, the member of parliament of that party.
Chamara Sampath Dasanayake said this while speaking with a radio channel.
The great revolt of the masses has overthrown an authoritarian president in Sri Lanka, but it has not abolished the executive presidency. Indeed, on July 18, within days of assuming office as acting President, Ranil Wickremesinghe declared an Emergency, to supposedly ensure the safety of parliamentarians who are to vote for a President on July 20.
Such executive overreach has been the bane of problems in Sri Lanka. There has been no moment in the last four decades more opportune than this to rid the country of this undemocratic institution. Then why are the liberal reformers and lawmakers so reluctant to move on abolishing the executive presidency? It is because the office of the executive president is being projected as the custodian of law, order and property in these tumultuous times. Sri Lanka is in a great moment of revolt, but it is far from a revolution, for a revolution would entail changing our fundamental social relations including property relations. Nevertheless, a radical consciousness is emerging among the masses, who are protesting on the streets and occupying the highest offices of the state.
Such power of the people has unnerved the liberal quarters and international actors who are quick to warn of anarchy, lawlessness and destruction of property. Indeed, the people’s struggle could escalate to occupying private property and demands for redistribution. However, through the many months of the crisis, the government and the Opposition in Parliament have avoided discussing redistribution. They cannot even stomach higher direct taxes, let alone a wealth tax. Instead, their energies go into begging international donors for funds and pushing the country into further debt.
It is these dynamics that are at play when the entrenched liberal political establishment, determined to preserve the neoliberal economic status quo, begins retreating into the constitutionality of the political process. Haven’t the very foundations of our political system been shaken by the greatest protests in Sri Lankan history? This is a moment when the social contract between state and society must be reconstructed. Without a new social contract, there is likely to be a no-holds-barred conflict with the working people.
At every moment in the last four months, parliamentary manoeuvres have undermined the protests and attempted to deflect people’s opposition. But those manoeuvres — whether it was the resignation of Cabinet Ministers in April, the appointment of Mr. Wickremesinghe as Prime Minister in May, or the attempts to pass a watered-down Amendment on the Executive Presidency in June — have eventually been confronted by the people’s movement. Similar dynamics are going to be at play when Parliament seeks to elect a President to complete the term of Gotabaya Rajapaksa. This time around, it is Mr. Wickremesinghe who has come to symbolise order and preservation of the status quo. His self-interest and the interests of some powerful political and global actors coincide in making him the front-runner for the post of interim President, who will be elected by Parliament. After all, it is clear that in a presidential election requiring the support of a popular majority, he would not stand a chance. He could not even win his seat in Parliament in the last election and only came into Parliament on the sole seat of his United National Party that suffered a terrible defeat.
Mr. Wickremesinghe lacks the social and political base to lead the country. He has no political credibility to speak of, or moral authority, after openly backing the country’s most discredited regime. However, his political survival depends on the support of three significant constituencies. First, the Rajapaksas and their party, the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), whose social base has been wiped out with mass opposition to their rule. The party is now in desperate need of someone at the helm of state power to protect it. Second, the top brass of the military, whose commander-in-chief and so-called war hero has fled the country, while international sanctions unnerve some in the military leadership. Third, international actors who would like to see their geopolitical interests served in Sri Lanka. Therein lies the great danger for the country.
What was considered a ‘political deal’ between the Rajapaksas and Mr. Wickremesinghe when he was appointed Prime Minister has now come into the open with the SLPP supporting his candidacy. Mr. Wickremesinghe will defend the Rajapaksas and further their interests, as he is dependent on their political base, corrupting politics to the hilt.
Next, he needs the military to suppress the protests as much as the military needs him to protect them. This quid pro quo creates the danger of authoritarian rule through further militarisation. As acting President last week, Mr. Wickremesinghe issued a gazette notification to include more subjects under the purview of the Ministry of Defence, including the Board of Investment, necessary for his authoritarian neoliberal project. Such militarisation will mount under his presidency, in addition to neoliberal policies of dispossession.
And as for international actors, a Wickremesinghe presidency with authoritarian stability will converge with their interests. A leader without a social and political base dependent on them will not just sing but also dance to their tunes, and sell the strategic assets of the country for a song.
In The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, Karl Marx wrote these opening lines about the failed French revolution of 1848: “Hegel remarks somewhere that all facts and personages of great importance in world history occur, as it were, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.” Marx was referring to the tragedy of Napoleon’s adventurous capture of state power and then the farce of his nephew Louis Bonaparte’s claim to be a similar leader many decades later. In Sri Lanka, J.R. Jayewardene’s ascendance to power in 1977, the creation of the executive presidency, the initiation of neoliberal policies, his alignment with the U.S. amidst the Cold War, and the repression of organised labour and the Tamil minority culminating in the civil war, was a devastating tragedy. Now, Mr. Wickremesinghe , Jayewardene’s nephew, has grand ambitions of capturing the presidency, repressing the people’s movement and taking forward the neoliberal project. It is a farce from every angle. Mr. Wickremesinghe has neither the social nor political base of Jayewardene. The people’s movement has become far more politically conscious with the nationwide protests. And the global neoliberal project itself is in crisis now.
Even if Mr. Wickremesinghe were to be elected, his tenure will remain contested, and may last only till the next wave of protests. But it would polarise society, generate a xenophobic backlash against the external actors who back him and ravage the economic lives of people.
Through the manoeuvres of those in power, the people are being pushed to continue on the path from revolt to revolution. If state power is brought to serve a class project in the figure of Mr. Wickremesinghe, the political crisis will aggravate. Who is ready for this wager?
Ahilan Kadirgamar is a political economist and Senior Lecturer, University of Jaffna, Sri Lanka
