Sri Lanka Presidential Election - January 8, 2015

[politicus]

50,9-47,9 at 9 mio.

A bit of a shame Rajapaksa conceded. otherwise I might have been able to convince myself this one could go down to the wire.

[politicus]

51.3-47.6 at 11,9

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Turnout 81.52%. More than 12.2 million voted.

Final result Sirisena 51.28% vs. Rajapaksa 47.58%

In Northern Province where many voters were turned away Vanni had a turnout of 72.57% after all, but that might have been 80%+ if all who tried had voted. Rajapaksa got 19.07%+ up there, which is unrealistic. Luckily it didn't matter.

Jafna had 66.28% turnout. With 21.85% to Rajapaksa. Even less realistic.

Still, much better than last time where Jafna was 25%. The Tamils voted after all - we will never know exactly how many were disenfranchised.

[politicus]

The polling division map (from Wiki). District map looks neater. Sirisena won 12 out of 22 districts.



Link to district map:

http://election.dailymirror.lk/presidential/en

Ethnic maps for comparison:

[politicus]

Sirisena won Colombo 55.93%-43.4% and the capital had a 82.67% turnout. He got 10 out of 15 polling divisions.

[politicus]

Let's spare a thought for the candidates that finished third and fourth: Arachchige Rathnayaka Sirisena and Namal Rajapaksa.

Well, the good old dummy candidate stunt didn't work this time. Almost no one were fooled.

[politicus]

[politicus]

Sirisena has already been sworn in (at 6PM local time).

[politicus]

One of the big losers in this election is Rajapaksa’ s personal astrologer, who told him to call the election two years early. Sumanadasa Abeygunawardena (63) faces early retirement after his reputation as a seer has been ruined by the unfortunate advice, but as he says:

“Not all of Nostradamus’ predictions have come true either. There was only so much I could do to help him win, maybe 5%. But you must have luck to be the president”

So 5% is the maximum you get from the right alignment of the stars.. Good to know, but maybe he should have told Rajapaksa that in advance.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/13/nostradamus-wrong-astrologer-advised-sri-lankas-president-election

[politicus]

The new government will investigate whether Rajapaksa tried to hang on to power using illegal means. They claim he only gave up his plans after the army chief and IG of the police declined to go along with the coup plot.

http://www.dw.de/sri-lanka-to-investigate-rajapaksa-coup-and-conspiracy-attempt/a-18184514