The Sri Lankan parliamentary elections held on November 14 were historic.
The working-class party, Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (People’s Liberation Front, JVP) — part of the National People’s Power (Jathika Jana Balawegaya, NPP) coalition — gained an outright majority in the country’s 225-seat parliament.
The NPP — made up of trade unions, women’s, students’ and other civil society organisations — previously defeated established elitist bourgeois parties at the September 21 presidential elections.
At November’s parliamentary elections, the NPP won 62% of the vote, with the opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (United Peoples Power, SJB) gaining 18%.
Sri Lanka has 22 electoral districts. The 225 parliamentary seats consist of 196 elected seats with 29 additional seats set aside for the national lists.
Gaining 159 seats was a landslide victory for the NPP, which only had three seats in the previous parliament. The SJB, which gained 40 seats, is a splinter of the United National Party (UNP), a key bourgeois party since independence in 1948.
The other main parties to win parliamentary seats were the Ilankai Thamil Arasu Katchchi (ITAK), a Tamil party mainly in the north and east, with seven seats and the National Democratic Front (NDF), with three seats.
The NDF is a remnant of the UNP, which launched the market economy in 1977. It was led by former President Ranil Wickremesinghe, and its three successful candidates joined the party just prior to the elections.
The “Rajapaksa party”, Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (Sri Lanka People’s Front, SLPP), which dominated parliament from 2004‒15 and again 2019‒24, achieved only 3% of the vote, winning three elected seats and one national list seat.
The Tamil and Muslim parties gained about 6% of the vote.
The 29 national list seats are made up of: NPP — 18 seats, SBJ — 5, NDF — 2, ITAK — 1, SLPP — 1, Sri Lanka Muslim Congress — 1 and Sarvajana Balaya — 1.
The NPP won almost 7 million of the 11 million votes cast. This exceeded the Rajapaksa regime’s result in 2010, after it brutally ended the anti-Tamil war — which included genocidal elements, similar to what is taking place in Gaza.
Voter turnout was around 69%, less than the 75% turn-out at September’s presidential elections. Around 5.3 million registered voters failed to vote. The elections were held on a Thursday and many could not leave work to vote (especially in tourism-related workplaces). There was poor disability access and many were disappointed with the performance of non-NPP candidates and incumbent MPs.
Recognising the popular support for the NPP, less than 1000 candidates actively campaigned out of about 8000 running for election. There were no major rallies held by the dominant bourgeois parties, nor large advertising campaigns, including posters, banners and cut outs.
It was a sign that a majority of voters were ready for a “system change” in the parliament and tired of the commercialised election spectacle. It highlighted the collective resentment towards established party politics, entrenched in corruption, nepotism, violence and a lack of accountability.
At September’s presidential elections, the NPP performed poorly among voters in the Hill Country plantation Tamil areas, as well as Tamil and Muslim areas in the north and east. However, this time, they remedied these weaknesses and attracted voters by nominating suitable candidates from local communities.
A key NPP achievement was getting more women elected to parliament. Women representatives increased from 12 (5.8 %) to 23 (10.2%), with 20 of them from the NPP. However, the NPP nominated only 34 women among 262 candidates (13%). Among the NPP’s women candidates were three women from the Tamil plantation community — a historic achievement, given the patriarchal family dynamics of established political parties in the Hill Country.
The NPP’s victory reflects a shift in the political consciousness of voters, who rejected the enduring culture of electoral politics of the established parties, entrenched in patronage and promoting interest of capital rather than enhancing the welfare of the working class.
The win also illustrates how the JVP was able to form a broad coalition of social movements and networks under the NPP, to strategically reassert working-class politics.
The NPP, popular uprising and other socialists
The NPP’s rise to power directly relates to the 2022 popular uprising against the ruling Rajapaksa regime. The uprising, somewhat similar to the Arab Spring and anti-austerity protests in Portugal, Spain and Greece more than a decade ago, was independent of political parties, and was coordinated by a range of activists, including those within working-class parties.
While the JVP supported the uprising, the core activists were more allied with the Frontline Socialist Party (FSP). The FSP split from the JVP in 2012, more focused on challenging the Sinhala-Buddhist ethno-nationalism that continues to marginalise Tamil and Muslim communities in the north and the east, as well as the Hill Country Tamil community.
The FSP contested the parliamentary elections under the People’s Struggle Alliance (PSA), led by progressive activists involved with the 2022 popular uprising.
The PSA was established in June and includes the FSP, two smaller socialist parties and a range of other activists. Two key PSA leaders — Nuwan Bopage and Swasthika Arulingam — are activist lawyers engaged in social justice issues.
According to the PSA’s website, the alliance aims to “transform the current socio-political and economic systems of Sri Lanka by building a socialist society” and “to address the problems affecting the majority of the population, solve long-term national issues, oppose external influences such as the IMF, and resist unnecessary foreign interference from countries like India and the United States”.
Rise of the NPP
The rise of the NPP demonstrates how the JVP was able to strategically leverage the popular uprising and the political and economic crisis that emerged with the COVID-19 pandemic.
The JVP was established by a Communist Party splinter group in the mid-1960s, and attracted mostly educated and unemployed Sinhala rural youth.
It launched an unsuccessful armed insurrection in 1971, expressing class grievances and protesting caste oppression among rural Sinhala communities. Falsely accused of instigating the July 1983 anti-Tamil pogrom, the JVP was banned by the ruling authoritarian regime (1977‒94) led by the UNP.
The UNP launched a patriarchal Sinhala-Buddhist ethno-nationalist project that instigated the nearly 30-year anti-Tamil civil war (1983‒2009).
The JVP launched a second insurrection (1988‒90), in reaction to the UNP government agreeing to allow Indian peacekeeping troops to address the impasse with the Tamil liberation struggle. This was a brutal historical event with nearly 60,000 lives lost and the state mobilising death squads and launching torture chambers to repress the uprising.
After most of its leadership were assassinated by 1990, the JVP retreated from representative politics and re-emerged in 2004 allied with the Rajapaksa regime, which asserted a militarised state strategy rather than peace talks with militant Tamil groups.
The JVP gained 39 parliamentary seats during this time, which expanded their electoral representation.
Now-President Anura Kumara Dissanayake (AKD) was appointed Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Land and Irrigation from 2004‒05. However, following the brutal end to the anti-Tamil war in 2009, the JVP opposed the Rajapaksa regime and joined the opposition. The JVP’s voter base then declined, owing to internal conflicts and strategic disorientation, until the presidential elections in September.
Shifting populist politics to the left
The dramatic defeat of the Rajapaksa party in these two recent elections highlights the impact of the popular uprising on the political consciousness of voters. It revealed the lack of accountability of established party politics entrenched in populism.
Such populist politics that feign a closeness to the “people” while glorifying charismatic leaders, is a trademark of right-wing leaders such as Donald Trump in the United States, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, India’s Narendra Modi and Italy’s Giorgia Meloni.
However, such populist politics is mainly about reinforcing the economic, political and cultural powers of the elites, while dividing the working classes.
These elites include a range of actors across business, media, religion, arts, academia, think-tanks, civil society and trade unions. The main aim is to create a “popular-national” project that further expands deregulated markets, enabling the accumulation of profits, while destroying communities and the ecology they depend on.
The NPP shifted these dynamics by changing the culture of electoral politics. Following his electoral victory, the new president appealed to the voters not to engage in excessive celebrations and retaliatory attacks against opposing parties, which is prevalent in electoral politics. Instead, he encouraged the public to celebrate in a peaceful and non-violent manner, avoiding fireworks and crackers.
The lack of electoral violence is a key change with the NPP gaining power. The local mainstream media and the opposition parties used the memories of the JVP’s violent past to instil fear and doubt among voters. However, following the presidential elections, the NPP shifted the narrative by avoiding wasteful ceremonial state rituals to illustrate government accountability to the public.
The NPP was also able to shift the culture of patronage by enabling the Electoral Commission to enforce laws against vote-buying. Incumbent government political candidates often reappropriate state and public resources to engage in vote-buying. The JVP, refraining from these past corrupt unethical practices, was able to gain the confidence of voters — including from the middle class — who were previously loyal to the established parties.
A key NPP policy promise is the abolition of the executive presidency, which has undermined the parliament as well as the independence of the judiciary. This also overlaps with transforming the enduring Sinhala-Buddhist ethno-nationalist project.
The “national question”, recognising the rights and grievances of the Tamil and Muslim communities, particularly in the north and east, will be a key challenge for the NPP. The NPP winning the Jaffna district in the North indicates a major shift in the country’s electoral landscape. Voters have rejected the patrimonial politics among the Tamil political parties that undermined popular participation.
The NPP has promised the return of the lands held by the military in these areas to the local communities and the release of Tamil political prisoners, imprisoned for more than a decade. But, the NPP remains ambivalent regarding the devolution of powers to the north and east, which illustrates a strategic compromise — for now — with the Sinhala-Buddhist chauvinists. The complexities of addressing the “national question” are also about the NPP’s ability to articulate class politics and the politics of redistribution, to build solidarity across different ethnic and religious communities.
Debt and electoral politics
The NPP’s shift in policy towards a social democratic project remains restricted by the International Monetary Fund-driven debt restructuring agenda. The agenda is directly aimed at raising taxes, expanding the commercialisation of the state and reducing public spending on health, education and welfare. Meanwhile, reducing the military budget is not within the scope of debate around debt restructuring.
The elite groups, along with their international allies, will attempt to shift the NPP towards an authoritarian project in order to maintain “business as usual”. The head of the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce — one of two main employer associations — was appointed as the Senior Economic Advisor to the president.
The new president also appointed key business actors into sectors such as telecommunications and retail trade, where the commercialisation of the state is on the IMF’s proposed agenda. The commercialisation of state enterprises allows these newly created public-private partnerships to avoid public accountability and transparency. Meanwhile, the NPP’s policy agenda of “economic democracy” has avoided any discussions around labour market reforms, aimed at strengthening collective bargaining institutions and enforcing workers’ right to form unions.
Working class parties and social movements
The dynamic between the JVP and the NPP will be crucial for building on these political gains. Local government elections, which may be held in January next year, had been postponed since 2018 by the Rajapaksa regime. These polls will elect 8711 members into municipal, urban and divisional councils.
The JVP has illustrated its capacity to change and has adapted to the new democratic aspirations asserted by the people, as well as a range of activist groups and networks.
The mobilisation of women leading up to the presidential elections was a key strategy leading to more women representatives in the new parliament. However, less women were nominated as candidates, and only one selected into the NPP national list. The struggle against patriarchal culture within the JVP and NPP also relates to transforming sexist cultures at work, in communities and families.
While a range of unions supported the NPP, the authoritarian tendencies within the JVP’s trade union fronts — and its student movement — has meant the JVP often devalued building substantive alliances with progressive trade unions and civil society organisations.
Building alliances and solidarity will be central to strengthen the NPP, which is more diverse and inclusive in its strategic orientation.
It is important to recognise the dynamic between representative party politics and social movements. Most bourgeois parties restrain participatory democratic structures that are integral to democratic social movements. More importantly, party finances and access to state resources enable much more political leverage than democratic social movements, which are mostly based on activist networks and meagre finances.
Building solidarity between party activists and activist networks, mobilising political, economic and cultural resources, will be significant to strengthening the NPP as a citizenship movement, expressing the sovereignty of the people. This relates back to the recent memories of the 2022 popular uprising, based on participatory democratic and inclusive cultures that deposed an undemocratic and authoritarian president.
The NPPs broad alliance of unions, political parties, women’s groups, youth groups, civil society groups and activist networks, has its work cut out to democratise the JVP and the state, while building solidarity.
This landslide victory of a working-class party is a historic moment to reimagine working and living, while nurturing non-violent representative politics. It is a moment to bring forward discussion around transforming market-driven economies towards public-driven economies that also address ecological concerns — locally and with a sense of the global. It is also a moment to remedy concerns of unemployment, underemployment and poverty, by reorganising labour markets and revaluing labour, including care work, within families and communities.