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Parliamentarians who failed to deliver
A number of parliamentarians from both the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and United National Party (UNP) failed to secure victory in their respective electorates on behalf of the presidential candidates they supported at the recently concluded Presidential Election.
Several top ministers in the Mahinda Rajapaksa administration were defeated in their own areas even though the former president managed to win the majority of the electorates in the Southern, North Western and Sabaragamuwa provinces.
In the Gampaha district, the electorates of Wattala, Negombo, Katana and Ja-ela were won by candidate Maitripala Sirisena despite the UPFA having several high profile parliamentarians from the district including, Sarath Kumara Guneratne, Felix Perera, and Dr. Mrs. Sudharshini Fernandopulle.
Mr. Sirisena also won the Kelaniya electorate which until recently was held by UPFA MP Mervyn Silva who was the UPFA organizer of the area.
However Attanagalla, the stronghold of the Bandaranaike family was secured by the Mahinda Rajapaksa despite a vigorous campaign by former president Chandrika Kumaratunga to secure it for the opposition candidate.
Minister Jeewan Kumaratunga -the organiser of the Moratuwa electorate- could not secure a majority in his area, while UPFA MP Thilanga Sumathipala failed to secure the Borella electorate of which he was organiser. Senior Minister A.H.M. Fowzie too failed to secure a victory for the UPFA candidate in his electorate -Colombo Central. Candidate Maithripala Sirisena secured 81.28 percent of the vote in this area.
MP Duminda Silva also lost the Kolonnawa electorate.
Despite Reginald Cooray and Rohitha Abeygunawardena both UPFA MPs from the area campaigning for Mahinda Rajapaksa, Maithripala Sirisena won the electorates of Panadura and Beruwela in the Kalutara district.
While former President Mahinda Rajapaksa received a majority of the votes from the south, especially in his hometown in the Hambantota district, the Matara and Galle electorates went to President Maithripala Sirisena.
In the electoral district of Kandy, except for Uda-dumbara and Galagedara, all other electorates went to Mr. Sirisena despite many high profile parliamentarians coming from the area. Among them were MP Lohan Ratwatte, Tissa Attanayake, Dilum Amunugama, former Higher Education Minister S.B. Dissanyake, former Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne and former Sports Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage all of whom are members of Parliament from the electorates of Patha-Dumbara, Kundasale, Senkadagala, Udunuwara, Gampola and Nawalapitiya respectively.
Despite the presence of these heavyweights however, presidential candidate Maitripala Sirisena topped the Kandy district with 466,994 votes (54.56 %).
In the Matale district, UPFA MP Rohana Dissanayake could not deliver his electorate to candidate Mahinda Rajapaksa.
Veteran Ministers of the Mahinda Rajapaksa government, Nimal Sripala de Silva and Dilan Perera too were unable to secure majorities in the electorates of Badulla and Hali-ela in the Badulla district. Mr. Sirisena won by 52.41 percent in Badulla while in Hali-ela he received 51.17 percent of the vote.
The Puttalam electorate with a voter population of over 125,000, went to Mr. Sirisena despite the efforts of UPFA MP K. Baiz.
Similarly Rohana Dissanayake and Lakshman Wasantha Perera from Rattota and Matale district proved failures.
Maitripala Sirisena was able to score a huge victory in the estate sector especially in the Nuwara Eliya-Maskeliya electorate obtaining 171,578 votes compared to Rajapaksa’s 57,718 votes. This was despite former Livestock and Rural Development Minister Arumugam Thondaman extending his support to Rajapaksa.
However the other two estate sector MPs P. Digambaram and V. Radhakrishnan helped the opposition candidate to win comfortably there. Former Minister C.B. Ratnayake was also unable to deliver his Walapane seat in the Nuwara Eliya district.
In like manner, Deputy Minister Sanath Jayasuriya too failed to secure the Matara electorate for UPFA candidate Rajapaksa.
Mahinda Rajapaksa was victorious in the Kurunegala District, except in the electorates of Kurunegala and Mawathagama where Jayaratne Herath and Neranjan Wickremasinghe are UPFA parliamentarians.
M.L.A.M. Hizbullah and A.L.M. Athullah proved to be big failures as voters handed huge majorities to President Sirisena in the Batticaloa and Kalmunai electorates -with Batticoloa giving President Sirisena an 80.39 percent majority and Kalmunai 89.81 percent.
Jaffna district secured a massive victory for Mr. Sirisena with all 11 electorates voting for him despite the best efforts of Minister Douglas Devananda (Kayts), S. Alantin from Jaffna and MP M. Chandrakumar from Killinochchi.
UNP MPs Sujeewa Senasinghe from Kaduwela and MP Wijeyadasa Rajapaksha too were unable to win the Kaduwela and Maharagama electorates for Mr. Sirisena.
Similarly, MP Ruwan Wijewardene was able to secure 48.94 percent of the voters from his electorate at Biyagama.
The Galle electorate in the Galle district went to Mr. Sirisena despite UPFA MPs Ramesh Pathirana and Manusha Nanayakkara being sitting MPs. The rest of the district voted for Mr. Rajapaksa.
UNP MPs Ranjan Ramanayake and Thalatha Athukorale too failed to win an electorate in the Ratnapura District where candidate Rajapaksa claimed all the electorates.
Similarly, all four electorates in Hambantota went to Mahinda Rajapaka despite strong campaigning from parliamentarian Sajith Premadasa.