Sri Lanka set for snap polls on November 14: Here's how parliament is elected
Sri Lanka President Anura Kumara Dissanayake
Sri Lanka is set to vote in a snap general election on Thursday (Nov 14) called by its Marxist-leaning President Anura Kumara Dissanayake to seek a fresh mandate to back his policies in the debt-ridden island nation.
Dissanayake was elected as the president in September, however, his National People's Power (NPP) coalition gained only three of 225 seats in the parliament.
It prompted him to dissolve the legislature and seek a fresh mandate to continue his economic reforms.
Millions of voters in the economically-crippled nation have put their faith in Dissanayake's graft-fighting pledge and vowed to strengthen the economy.
"In past elections, people did not have confidence in us but in September people gave us victory and proved that we are a winning party and we can form a government," the incumbent president said during a campaign rally on Sunday.
"The next task is to unite people from the four corners of this country and build a powerful people's movement."
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How will the island nation elect its new parliament?
Sri Lanka's presidentdissolved parliament on September 24 to clear the way for the general election. It comes days after he was elected president on a platform for change.
The election then became necessary as Dissanayake had just three lawmakers in the outgoing parliament.
The campaigning for the snap elections ended on Monday (Nov 11) at midnight.
Sri Lanka has 17.1 million voters who will be voting tomorrow (Thursday). Moreover, around one million of them are first-time voters.
Watch |Sri Lanka Gears Up for Pivotal Elections Tomorrow
Election process
Voting will begin at 7:00am (local time) and will end at 4:00 pm. The counting of votes will start right after the polling ends.
Voters directly elect 196 members to parliament from 22 constituencies under a proportional representation system. Meanwhile, the remaining 29 seats will be allocated as per the country's wide proportional vote obtained by each party.
Moreover, a voter can cast up to three preferential votes for candidates contesting from their choice of party.
After all this ends, the votes will be counted at polling stations by the government employees with heightened security. The process will be supervised by Election Commission officials, election monitors and representatives of candidates.
(With inputs from agencies)
