COI Report March 2012 - UK Border Agency - Home Office

SRI LANKA 7 MARCH 2012
FREEDOM OF POLITICAL EXPRESSION
13.01 The US State Department 2010 Human Rights Report: Sri Lanka (USSD 2010) 232 ,
released on 8 April 2011 noted that:
―The government is dominated by the president's family; two of the president's brothers
hold key executive branch posts as defense secretary and minister of economic
development, while a third brother is the speaker of parliament. Independent observers
generally characterized the presidential and parliamentary elections as problematic.
Both elections were fraught with violations of the election law by all major parties and
were influenced by the governing coalition's massive use of state resources…
[introductiory section]
―The president, who was reelected in January [2010] for a second six-year term, holds
executive power, while the 225-member parliament, elected in April [2010], exercises
legislative power… A number of violent incidents occurred during the campaign period,
with five deaths connected to election-related violence, but there were few reported
incidents of election-related violence or election law violations on election day.
However, independent observers reported countless violations of election law by the
president's ruling coalition and, to a lesser extent, by the main opposition parties during
the weeks leading up to election day. The president's ruling coalition was accused of
massive use of state resources in support of the president's campaign, including the
repeated use of official vehicles, offices, and personnel to hold campaign events and to
conduct voter education efforts that favored the president.
―The final vote count gave President Rajapaksa approximately 58 percent of the vote,
with the main opposition candidate, retired general Sarath Fonseka, receiving just over
40 percent. There were no reliable public opinion polls conducted during the election
campaign with which to compare these results. There were allegations of possible fraud
occurring at counting centers, as ballots were tallied and totals reported to the elections
commissioner. In several counting centers opposition party observers were chased
away by government supporters. While many observers questioned the size of
Rajapaksa's margin of victory, most believed that the results represented the will of the
electorate. There were calls for a recount of ballots, but the elections commissioner
refused to do so. By law election ballots are retained for one year following an election
in case of a dispute. The elections commissioner has the power to release them, but he
refused to allow any independent inspection of the ballots, even after a formal request
by local election monitoring organizations to do so. Imprisoned opposition candidate
Fonseka filed a petition in court to overturn the results of the election, based on the
allegations of elections law violations and counting fraud, but on October 29 the
Supreme Court dismissed the case on technical grounds without rendering a decision
on the merits of the case, stating that it would be impossible to prove in court whether
the alleged fraud and violations occurred to the point of justifying the disqualification of
Rajapaksa as a candidate.‖
13.02 The USSD 2010 report 233 also noted that: ―The law provides citizens the right to change
their government peacefully, and citizens exercised this right in practice through
232 US State Department 2010 Human Rights Report: Sri Lanka (USSD 2010), released on 8 April 2011,
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2010/sca/154486.htm , date accessed 11 May 2011
233 US State Department 2010 Human Rights Report: Sri Lanka (USSD 2010), released on 8 April 2011,
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2010/sca/154486.htm , date accessed 11 May 2011, Section 3
102 The main text of this COI Report contains the most up to date publicly available information as at 3 February 2012.
Further brief information on recent events and reports has been provided in the Latest News section
to 2 March 2012.