The Importance of Revisiting the New Mixed Electoral Process

(Through revisiting the earlier comment on the concluded local Government Election)

The Election Commission has just concluded the process of electing the members for the local government bodies that are going to administer its voters; the hurried in a rather slip shot way and hence the voters have no clue whatsoever what ward or constituency they belong to or the candidate they voted for, and more pathetically the electors does not know who they have elected for their unknown ward or electorate! Yes, the polling card issued to the voters bears the name of the ward the same voter belongs. 

A political double way pressure first to delay and then to expedite the election rather unnecessarily, a rather pathetically hilarious situation when considering the blatant claim that that the Election Commission is Independent of Political Authority after the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution.

 The reason for the political authority holding the strings until the last moment or rather with a pretext of - the shift of electoral process from absolute proportional system to mixed electoral system that mixes both the process that have been practiced in Sri Lanka, one that was just replaced and the other one was just 37 years ago. Anyhow The Election Commission should be commended for applying the new electoral process for the election and selection of increased numbers of members 8300 odd for 340 bodies, though with some acrimonious reservations! Chairman of Commissioner may be exhausted and deserves a lengthy rest for withstanding the maneuvering political pressure of the past and future for the ultimate electoral Process emerges.   

My emphasizing point here is, that a candidate for an electorate should not be masquerading as a symbol to be elected.  

Majority of the Politicians of South East Asian Countries wanted to sustain power at all costs for the greed of power aimed at greedy wealth – they see winner politics as a wealth accumulating means and apply all the dirty tricks available to secure the winner position! Violence is a common trick during electioneering. 

The super greedy Sri Lankan politicians have gone a step ahead are constantly meddling with electoral process itself to hold on to the power for the reasons above. When UNP regime without foreseeing or considering the demerits of the absolute PR system that were well discussed among educated elite prowess and the universities – went ahead with the disastrous change as a show of 5/6 strength majority.

Disastrous consequences felt since were

1)      the voter not recognizing his or her actual representative

2)       pitched violence among the candidates irrespective of opposing or same party candidates

3)      Winner candidate becoming irresponsible towards the voter needs – through escapism by virtue of many members representing a single larger electorate

4)      A single larger electorate inducts severe competition among the candidates and that in  indulges

a.      Pitched violence b. very expensive electioneering and c. costs need of huge manpower

Equal distribution of ethnic representation is the only advantage the absolute PR system carried, against the all the above-mentioned constraints that in turn emancipated many catastrophic social evils – being part of drug trafficking, illicit liquor distilling, bribe, fraud, and corruption,  in order to meet the ends, demanded by a. to c.  Stated in above 4).

The way mixed electoral process applied in the just concluded election virtually has not addressed the constraints properly though to a certain extent 2) and 4) of above.

 Therefore it is emphasized here that reverting back to total PR system is an absolute disastrous towards social responsibility.  

In respect to No 1) above I strongly condemn the Election Commission (EC) for not promoting  to the ballot paper samples of First Past the Post System put out by Department of Elections 41 years ago that would have enabled the voters to identify their ward or electorate with its candidate; I also strongly condemn the EC for failing to apply the procedure that was available in the just replaced absolute proportional system enabling the voter the  all-important candidate identity, though one of the reasons this system to be replaced was lack of proper identification of candidates in the ballot paper which had numbers properly displayed by each party; though inability of the EC clearly an outcome of a maneuvering political pressure politicians squandering preference to the PR system character that it would not easily reject as in FPP and to masquerade the good and bad the character of the candidates behind a symbol in the mixed system.

Election violence is a senseless Human behaviour, which has to be thwarted only through stringent implementation law and order, rather than compromising the best and basic procedures of polling processes. 

Though just concluded local government election was reported to be peaceful to an extent – post-election violence flared up not lesser than of previous elections, thus peaceful pre-election violence cannot be attributed to change of electoral process anyway but the manner the law and order were applied, thanks to the Election Commission!

The reason for removing the preferential voting criteria was that it inducted rivalry and pitched violence within the same party ranks, which does not mean any way that voter discretion for individual candidates of opposing parties has to be completely blocked.

It is the basic right of a voter to identify the candidate to whom she or he is going to cast her/his vote and it is the sole responsibility of the Election Commission for enabling or facilitate the identification of the candidate to the voter on a Ballot Paper, minimum by the name.

In one of my written proposals to Mixed Electoral Process, I have argued that a candidate lost for election in the ward contest should not be considered for selection through the PRS part of the process. Though this methodology appropriates the real purpose of an election Sri Lankan politicians have set aside this proposal for their own convenience – but have stuck onto the handing over of two sets of name list at the nomination level demanded only by the same criteria with some vested interest- in order to stay more proxy of PR system even though the so claimed mixed electoral process of FPPS and PRS.    

Further, it is a citizen’s basic right to decide upon whether to contest a single ward or electorate or as a group to group of wards – Individuals discretion to serve lonely to a ward or an electorate cannot be hindered by election rules. There are qualified professionals men and women who opt to serve their ward or electorate alone rather than committing into a group. Likewise, a party symbol alone cannot be allowed to obscure the individual popularity or the character or vice versa through the Ballot Paper served to cast the vote.   

My emphasizing point here is in order to ensure the Identity of the candidate the new mixed electoral process basically should emanate from the Ballot Paper Models of prior 1977 FPPS, that ensures the winner representative of an electorate known publically, as soon as the counting is over and then the PRS be applied to all those lost the election by pooling all losing vote of the area major against the total voter turnout of the same area calculating and preparing a merit list of percentage. (https://mahadevafreelancevetrinarian.blogspot.com/2017/10/blatant-miss-calculation-by-minority.html)

The best-suited proportion for mixed electoral process FPPS to PRS is 70:30 here the political parties have meddled too heavily to spoil it, that is why it is emphasized to leave the Election Commission and its prowess along with the permanent Delimitation Committee as independent organizations, so that the expertise formulate an appropriate Electoral Process for the nation free of any political pressure. Any complaint against the expert formulation the expert committee shall explain the merits to the Parliament’s special committee. 

It should not be compulsory to submit two different lists on nominations-  it should only be the Political Parties’ discretion, but all political parties shall submit PRS selection list within 48 hours of completion of the FPPS part of the Mixed Electoral Process so that to be eligible for PRS part selection of members.  In such an arrangement both an individual as well as a group of independent candidates accommodated for election and afterward selection if requested by the same group. There shouldn’t be any need for floating number members – it should be a strict rigid number for particular body = Parliament or Local body. Deviation merit** list based on the losers’ vote count distance against the mean number* needed to be elected will decide the selection or rejection – best performing candidate amongst the 5% minimum qualifiers becomes eligible for membership in the ruling body, so that every political party obtaining more than 5% vote (or any less number of percentage stipulated EC) need not be accommodated for PRS selection.

*mean number needed to be elected = Total number of votes cast ÷ number members of local body

**Closer the votes received to mean number needed to be elected becomes better of the next.

Mixed Electoral Process shall not carry any Multimember Constituency, particularly for smaller Pradeshiya Sabbhas. It is quite an absurdity to have increased the number of members for Pradeshiya Sabbhas almost double fold in order to accommodate the new mixed electoral process – this is just another political bribing manipulation; 336 Pradeshiya Sabbhas had 4486 members equaling 13.3 per Pradeshiya Sabha, which has now increased to 24.5 through 341 Pradeshiya Sabbhas holding 8356 members, whereas just around 15 to 16 per Pradeshiya Sabha would have justifiably satisfied the accommodation  of New Mixed Electoral Process with whatever the percentage of FPPS to PRS.   

It is the sole responsibility of the Election Commission to ensure the voters cast the votes to an appropriate person (s) without any external influence by providing enough identity of candidates otherwise there is no any purpose in the mixed electoral process. Mere one Gazette notification and exhibiting photos of candidates at the Polling Booth will not reach entire voters and hence the beneficiaries of representatives in thousands.

An Electoral Process belongs to the voter, and political parties cannot meddle with it to unfair advantages! 

Robers' land of Sri Lanka is Continues to be a Battlefield of Blue and Green and a Third Purple Force Enters the Fray for Robbery

Robers' land of Sri Lanka is Continues to be a Battlefield of Blue and Green and a Third Purple Force Enters the Fray for Robbery 

At the administrative helms are a Captain Blue and a Vice-Captain Green, they have been doing their respective job freely, though to larger extend within themselves, and the spectators didn’t know what they have been performing until a third-year dawn on them! The year they both went to the spectators to know how they have been performing for the past two and a half year period.

In a pitched response, the all-important Public of Periphery has pushed a deposed through a fresh colour of Purple to the forefront very strongly to look after them in the very place they all are residing!  Even some town folk did the same out of frustration over the turnover of matters since Captain Blue and Vice-Captain Green took over the helm.  This Captain Purple though had come through fresh ranks is a clever old fox in holding the people within his ranks. Not only that people still strongly believe this Captain Purple is the savior off the war menacing the nation for three decades and thus living free of any fear of bombs! Being old fox wearing the war victory crown on his head went into this pitched battle well with cooked up plan, in disguise of getting the blessing of ever loving Public of Periphery for blooming the religious sentiment (of those same public) flower of lotus from well insinuated symbol of Lotus Bud and that insinuated symbol plan worked tremendously for Purple Captain apart from grievous mistakes of Captain Blue and Vice-Captain Green.

At one stage public strongly believed that the symbol lotus-bud would not be accepted as a political party symbol, but the Commissioner of Election interpreted that the Lotus Bud will not be an insinuation than the flower itself!        

When this deposed Purple Captain was in the unconquerable helm Vice-Captain Green dragged out that Blue Man from the strong ranks of Purple Captain, and asked the supporters to make that Blue Sera the Captain of the whole nation – and the public particularly the town folk responded swiftly to various accusations of fraud corruption, ransom, murders etc. on the regime of Purple Captain and made the Blue Sera the Captain Blue for the whole nation with high ranked Executive Powers intact until his term. Likewise, the Green man was made the Vice Captain through the August Assembly count!

Captain Blue never a National Captain but the Blue Camp

Since then Captain Blue is never the same Blue Sera, though the whole nation has been handed over to him he was more worried about his brought up house Blue Camp braking than the Nation to be put in order!! Despite being the Captain of the Nation had the nag of just complaining to the spectators than executing the executive powers intact!  Whenever inquiring the crude malpractices of the past regime was mulled among the joint runners of affairs Captain Blue sarcastically delayed and sometimes ignored totally.   One such situation was the appointment of a foreigner as prime regulator financial of affairs, the final executive the National Captain was not even bothered by the fact that the appointee an absolute foreigner, authorized the Vice-Captain Green’s selection.  This is despite knowing the facts being an intrinsic part of the problematic former regime who for the first time in the history of Prime Financial Regulator Institution broke the conventional practice of appointing the Governor from the experienced ranks within the same institution and appointed an outsider Accountant National Credit (ANC) who can dance to the tune of Purple Captain, who had feverish attraction for Closed Tender Procedures wherever calling tender mattered! The Captain Blue instead of preventing the daylight robbery at Central Body of all important Finance despite knowing the robber’s relationships (i.e. ANC’s sister is the Secretary to the Robber Group) to one another allowed it to happen and complained to the public in the midst of battle to the August Assembly in 2015!! The second occasion the Captain Blue embarked on complaining to the public just completed battle of local bodies was announced and this time the with reports of the commissions he appointed with vested political interest!! Hilariously Captain Blue asked for powers to deal with them in the local bodies contradicting himself already possessing being on top of the helm!!

What did the battlefield voters do, they found some similarities of this present blue camp with the JVP who always complained of fraud and corruption of the ruling party without any power in hand and dumped the Blue Camp in due place in the count – worse than JVP – a fourth grade either alone or combined! 

Will the public support complaining executive or a real effective executioner? The medical doctors of the playing field also have injected the idea of Purple Captain regime back by continuously striking and depriving the health care need of the peripheral population!

The combined Green and Blue conveniently imagined that they are fondle fiddling a cricket club economy and never a national economy, both imagined the supporters can be fooled easily once the power is within their ranked particularly the Vice-Captain Green.

Vice-Captain Green never a Darling of the Rural Population or Rural Economy

In the August Assembly battlefield, Green Camp just managed to better the Blue Camp combined after a lapse of nearly two decades. Vice-Captain Green never realized national economy can be vastly improved by improving the income of the rural population of the nation, always centered his policy-making around Colombo and urban areas, very much ignorant of the rural population and their representatives.  He miscalculated and believed that Elephant Symbol alone will be voted to power again and again according to the absolute PR electoral process and that made him and his team to lose again and again 30 times!

It his nag that appoints friends and classmates to top posts and when they blunder goes out of the way to defend them, without any public respect to the public opinion, induct other members as well to do so and find a scapegoat to escape the public opinion. He foolishly imagines that he had escaped through scapegoat never realizes he is being counted publicly - local battlefield counted on his attitude gave him the second place, even some of his forte urban areas fortified to dubious Purple Captain.

The national Captain Blue shocked by the fourth place placement in the fray for local bodies soaks into mentee of the Vice-Captain Green finding a convenient scapegoat for executive inaction failures turns table on Vice-Captain Green to give his own medicine – asking the Vice-Captain Green who still holds the highest count in August Assembly to resign and cover all the sins!

Simply Captain of the team is asking the Vice Captain of the team to resin for the captain’s inability.

If this attitude not is corrected soon it is inevitable that Professor of Law becoming Captain Purple of the Nation present Purple Captain becoming a Vice Captain of the Nation!   

Ballot Paper Without the names of the ward, unidentified candidates is a dangerous proxy of the absolute proportional system.

The Chairman,

The Commission of Elections

 Ballot Paper Without the names of the ward, unidentified candidates is a dangerous proxy of the absolute proportional system.

The Election Commission has just concluded the process of electing the members of the local government bodies that are going to administer its voters; the hurried in a rather slip shot way and hence the voters have no clue whatsoever what ward or constituency they belong to or the candidate they voted for, and more pathetically the electors does not know who they have elected for their unknown ward or electorate!

Such a pathetically hilarious situation has emancipated due to various reasons, and one of the reason is political double way pressure first to delay and then to expedite the election rather unnecessarily. The second most important though not last, the reason is the shift of electoral process from absolute proportional system to mixed electoral system, that mixes both the process that has been practiced in Sri Lanka,  one that was just replaced and the other one was just 37 years ago.

I with strong responsibility condemn the Election Commission (EC) for not referring to the ballot paper samples of First Past the Post System put out by Department of Elections 37 years ago that would have enabled the voters to identify their ward or electorate along with its candidate; I also strongly condemn the EC for failing to apply the procedure that was available in the just replaced absolute proportional system – swift enabling the voter the  all-important candidate identity, though one of the reasons this system to be replaced was lack of proper identification of candidates in the ballot paper which had numbers properly displayed by each party; the reason for removing the preferential voting criteria was that it  inducted rivalry and pitched violence within the same party ranks, that does not mean any way that voter discretion  for individual candidates of opposing parties had to be completely blocked.

It is a basic right of a voter to identify the candidate to whom she or he is going to cast her/his vote and it is the sole responsibility of the Election Commission for enabling or facilitate the identification of the candidate to the voter on a Ballot Paper.

Further, it is a citizen’s basic right to decide upon whether to contest a single ward or electorate or as a group to group of wards – Individuals discretion to serve lonely to a ward or electorate cannot be hindered by election rules. Likewise, a party symbol alone cannot be allowed to obscure the individual popularity in the Ballot Paper and vice versa.  

It is the sole responsibility of the Election Commission to ensure the voters cast the votes to an appropriate person(s) by providing enough identity of candidates otherwise there is no any purpose in the mixed electoral process.

Mere one Gazette notification and exhibiting photos of candidates at the Polling Booth will not reach entire voters and hence the beneficiaries of representatives in thousands.   

Ballot Paper Without the names of the ward, unidentified candidates is a dangerous proxy of the absolute proportional system.

Ballot Paper Without the names of the ward, unidentified candidates is a dangerous proxy of the absolute proportional system.