Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa lost his bid for a third term yesterday, ending a decade of rule that critics say had become increasingly authoritarian and marred by nepotism and corruption.
Opposition candidate Maithripala Sirisena, a one-time ally of Rajapaksa who defected in November and derailed what the president thought would be an easy win, took 51.3% of the votes polled in Thursday’s election. Rajapaksa got 47.6%, according to the Election Department.
Celebratory firecrackers were set off in the capital, Colombo, after Rajapaksa conceded his defeat to Sirisena, who has vowed to root out corruption and bring constitutional reforms to weaken the power of the presidency.
“We expect a life without fear,” said Fathima Farhana, a 27-year-old Muslim woman in Colombo. “I voted for him because he said he would create equal opportunities for all,” she said of Sirisena.
Like Rajapaksa, Sirisena is from the majority Sinhala Buddhist community, but he has reached out to ethnic minority Tamils and Muslims and has the support of several small parties.
His allies say he will rebalance the country’s foreign policy, which tilted heavily towards China in recent years as Rajapaksa fell out with the West over human rights and allegations of war crimes committed at the end of a drawn-out conflict with Tamil separatists in 2009.
