Yahapalanaya govt. in tailspin following election defeat
*Basil Rajapaksa man of the match* Sirisena in direct competition with Judas and Vibhishana
by C.A.Chandraprema-February 17, 2018, 8:29 pm
To say that the resounding electoral defeat of the governing coalition at the recent local government elections has set the cat among the canaries is an understatement. Up to the point when this article goes to press, the political aftershocks of the pohottuwa tsunami of February 10 continues with no end in sight. In the immediate aftermath of the defeat apologists for the government have been trying to say that the SLPP got only 45% of the vote and that the votes of all the yahapalana partners of January 2015, still outnumber the votes that Mahinda Rajapaksa got and that therefore, MR would have lost again if the February 10 poll had been a presidential election. The very crisis that shook the political establishment in the aftermath of this election shows that no one, not even the persons mouthing them, was convinced by such arguments. At the 2000, 2001 and 2004 parliamentary elections, governments were formed by political parties that got 45% of the vote. Besides, a local government election is very different to a presidential election. At a presidential election the vote gets polarized between the two main contestants and the others are rendered irrelevant.
