The mass uprising in Sri Lanka in the summer of 2022 had one unifying chant — “Gota go home”, reflecting the protesting citizens’ chief demand that then President Gotabaya Rajapaksa resign.
Dissanayake made it with his tally of preferential votes. His impressive win propelled the NPP to a historic supermajority in the general elections that soon followed. “I am not a magician; I am not a miracle-worker. There are things I know and don’t know,” Mr. Last week, President Dissanayake completed two years in office. He has been addressing rallies across the country as part of a series titled ‘People’s Rule — Two Years Strong. Progress for All’. The government opted to go ahead with the International Monetary Fund programme finalised by its predecessors, staunchly pursued fiscal discipline and macroeconomic stability as the IMF spelled them out, and achieved or even surpassed crucial targets set by the Fund. it gradually began following through with conviction While the ruling administration initially referred to the IMF programme as a compulsion in the economic and social circumstances in the country. Meanwhile, studies have found that poor families are eating less, as they struggle to cope with crushing austerity. Speaking to The Hindu at the JVP party headquarters on the NPP administration’s performance, Dr. The Dissanayake government has made a series of high-profile arrests, especially of notorious suspects in the narcotics underworld and prominent politicians and bureaucrats accused of grand corruption. Both were among the key promises the NPP made to Tamil voters. there has been no movement yet on the promised new constitution While the conduct of the provincial polls remains stuck with a parliamentary committee. Observing that the Aragalaya popularised a democratic imagination, Mr. The electorate’s verdict, he cautions, was more a rejection of old politics than affirmation of the NPP’s programme. “While the country was very clear about what it did not want, it is not as clear about what it wants, and even less clear about how to get there. The NPP government needs to initiate a robust, inclusive conversation on renegotiating a new social contract with citizens.”
Short of a clear majority in the three-cornered presidential race — he secured 42.31 % of the votes — Mr. Citizens who seemed torn or tentative in the September presidential polls were certain in November 2024. Dissanayake said soon after being sworn in on September 23, 2024. The arrest of a former intelligence chief in connection with the ongoing probe into the 2019 Easter terror bombings raised eyebrows. “We must remember that 2024 was not just any other election, with its outcome bringing about a regime change. After 1948 [Independence], it was the first time citizens felt they could negotiate a new political structure”. Peiris adds: “While voters rejected the old political class in the 2024 election, it was not really a baptism of a new political class.
They were going to give “AKD” and his government a real chance. “But I will commit to always doing the right thing, and to lead a collective effort to rebuild our nation,” the new President said in his first address to the country. Abeysinghe said it has “changed the political culture”. “Law enforcement is the same for all, whether it is a former president or anyone else,” Dr. Abeysinghe says. The government will focus on the Provincial Council elections and drafting a new constitution in the three years that remain of its term, according to him. The NPP government, in his view, looks more like a “government of good governance”, rather than one of transformation.
