Sri Lanka president faces tough challengers in elections

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe faces 38 challengers in polls next month, the election commission said after nominations closed on Thursday, with former ally Sajith Premadasa leading the pack.

It will be the first vote since Wickremesinghe took over two years ago, after protesters furious at an unprecedented financial crisis toppled strongman president Gotabaya Rajapaksa, and the economy remains at the forefront.

“I have increased production... But it´s not over yet. Life can be hard for some people. We have to stabilise the economy,” Wickremesinghe told reporters after submitting his nomination.

“So what we are saying is, let´s go ahead and finish this job.”

Wickremesinghe, 75, faces a daunting challenge from Premadasa, a 57-year-old career politician and the parliamentary leader of the opposition, as well as leftist leader Anura Kumara Dissanayaka, 55, whose National People´s Power (NPP) coalition is popular among the young.

The South Asian Buddhist-majority island nation will vote on September 21.

Premadasa vowed to tackle corruption.

“Right now, 22 million people of our country are suffering from incompetence, ineptitude, mass-scale corruption, and looting of the public treasury,” he said.

What started as a three-way battle became more complicated last week when the influential Rajapaksa family withdrew their support for Wickremesinghe in favour of one of their own -- Namal Rajapaksa.