Elections are critical events for countries since they mark the beginning of – or hope for – transformative times. In an LMDtv interview held shortly after the presidential election, Deputy Director of Media and Politics at Verité Research Deepanjalie Abeywardana discussed the Sri Lankan people’s post-election sentiment, highlighting the nation’s trends.

The presidential election held in September was unique in many ways – as she pointed out, in addition to being a three-way race, it was also the first time that a second round of counting preference votes was carried out.

She added that the people of Sri Lanka showed an “overwhelming sense of satisfaction” post-election.

Abeywardana explained: “We can boil down this satisfaction to at least two things. One is the fact that someone who doesn’t belong to a privileged background, an entitled political class or a family that has been in traditional politics for a very long time became the president.”

“We saw how there was so much energy and positive sentiment when [former] president Barack Obama became the president of the United States. Similarly, what we see right now is that energy and enthusiasm around the new president,” she averred.

She continued: “A part of this positive sense is because he is seen and very much celebrated as someone who broke barriers, and came from a non-privileged background to become president.”

The second reason for the people’s satisfaction, according to Abeywardana, is the president’s promise to fight corruption.

She noted: “There’s so much positive energy around the strong push against corruption, which was one of the big themes around which people mobilised themselves especially in the aftermath of the aragalaya in 2022.”

In terms of how the people will expect the new president to deliver his promise of curbing corruption, she believes that it isn’t so much about the speed of doing so as the salience with which the anti-corruption mission will be approached.

“Corruption has been a consistent concern that people have always been troubled by and angry about,” Abeywardana explained.

She noted: “And here’s an administration that people have elected to see that promise being fulfilled. So I think by looking at the sentiment, the expectation is about the salience with which this topic will be dealt with.”

Abeywardana asserted: “That will also probably be a yardstick to evaluate the government by [because] corruption has become a top priority…”

“There is hope,” she maintained, while highlighting that “there’s [always] a honeymoon period in which people are satisfied with the government.” Abeywardana explained that “this happens for a short while but then reality kicks in and it’s very much in terms of that salience that we will have to see how things are going to play out.”

During the interview, she also discussed the role of the media, which – especially during an election – informs and influences decision making on the part of the people.

And she pointed out that “despite the election commission having issued guidelines specifically addressing the media, that they should give equal coverage to all candidates,” what we witnessed was disproportionate coverage being afforded to some presidential candidates over others.

“It is crucial for the people to engage with the media with a critical mindset and perspective,” Abeywardana opined.

She elaborated: “Closer to an election, we see a lot of misinformation and information disorder taking place. So it is always good if voters adopt a very critical approach in terms of consuming what comes from mainstream media as well as social media.”

“We should not run into polarised narratives. We should be open to being challenged, and having another perspective that is data driven and factually correct as well,” she emphasised.

Abeywardana asserted that “what’s best for democracy is that we function as critical and informed citizens.”