Mediate to stop abuse of public property in Sri Lanka president's campaign for re-election -Opposition

(December 08, Colombo - Lanka Polity) The United National Front of Sri Lanka urges the Election Commissioner Dayananda Disanayaka to use the powers vested in him to curb the misuse of state powers and property in the campaign of ruling party candidate Mahinda Rajapakse.

The abuse of government property is in the peak with beginning of the presidential election. The state services, police and the state-owned media are the mostly misused sectors. The misuse of state property ranges from the photocopier belonged to the local government authority to  forks and spoons of the Temple Trees, the official residence of the President. The numerous parties in Temple Trees agenda are also abuses of public property. Further, various kinds of opening ceremonies are also abuses of powers since they are timed for political propaganda.

Recruitment, transfers and promotions etc. of the public officials are suspended when an election is underway in line with the election regulations. However, the government blatantly violates these laws to manipulate state powers for political purposes. The government forces the Ministry secretaries to allocate funds to recruit persons to use them in election campaigns. The using of ministry allocated vehicles and fuel for the political propaganda is another major abuse and corruption.

"According to the 17th amendment, the Election Commissioner must take action to curb abuse of public property," points out the United National Front. "The constitution has granted powers to the Election Commissioner to take action if any political party, person or independent group misuses the state property Further the election commissioner has powers to take action on police, state media and state services."

The United National Front urges the Election Commissioner to take actions against the abuse of state powers and property to guarantee a free and fare election  United National Front is inviting to all the political parties, civil society and non governmental organization to act to stop the corruption of current government. 

Elections Commissioner of Sri Lanka totally blind to election law violations in President's home province

(October 02, Colombo - Lanka Polity) Keerthi Tennekoon, Media spokesman of Sri Lanka election monitoring mission Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE) stated that, because the Elections Commissioner is taking no action against election law violations at the forthcoming Southern Provincial Council elections scheduled to be held on October 10, some of the candidates are openly and brazenly committing breach of election laws. "As such this election will go down in election history as one where election malpractices were openly allowed to be committed," he says.

"At other elections, the elections Commissioner who holds discussions with the party secretaries weekly has had no discussions this time," says CaFFE pointing out that the Commissioner has not even replied to the letter addressed to him by CaFFE in this regard. The Elections Commissioner has descended to such a level, CaFFE pinpointed.

The Elections Commissioner gave orders to remove the elections advertisements on either sides of his Office only after the media exposed these illegal acts. If the Elections Commissioner had any interest in halting these election malpractices, he has all the power to take action, Thennakoon asserted.