|
|
 |
  |
| Sunday, 11 July 2004 |
 |
|
 |
Politics | Today's Top Story |  |
| News Business Features
|
Polls sans queues by Deepal Warnakulasuriya Elections to Western, Southern, Central, North-Central, Uva and Sabaragamuwa Provincial Councils concluded yesterday with no major incidents. Most conspicuous feature of yesterday's election was the low voter turn out with no polling queues most of the time, except in plantation sector polling centres. Although over 9.5 million voters were eligible to cast their votes at 7663 polling centres, the turn out was between around 20 to 30 per cent during the first five hours of voting. Assistant Commissioner of Elections (Colombo District) A.G. Dharmadasa said that the voter turn out in Colombo was only about 25 per cent. Colombo has the highest number of registered voters 1,385,547. A spokesman from the Polonnaruwa District Assistant Elections Commissioner's office said that only 10 per cent of voters had turned out to cast their votes till mid-noon. However, the turn out was little better in Kandy where mostly plantation Tamils live. Counting process began at 768 counting centres which included 49 centres reserved for postal votes counting. A total of 122,890 government servants had been deployed at polling stations and counting centres. According to the Election Commissioner's Department, 23 recognised Political parties and 37 Independent groups have fielded 4,134 candidates vying for 316 seats in the six Provincial Councils. While only the Jathika Hela Urumaya boycotted the Provincial Council Elections saying they want the PCs abolished almost all other registered parties had come to the election fray. With two major parties the United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and the United National Party (UNP) that were vying for power in six provinces, another 18 parties with a number of independent groups were seen in efforts to secure seats under their names in respective provinces. Except for few minor incidents such as abuse and threat among supporters of rival political parties there were no major incidents reported from any part of the country, DIG Gamini Navaratne told the "Sunday Observer". 57,000 policemen have been detailed for election duty this time.Meanwhile five independent monitoring groups: PAFFREL, CMEV, NEMEC, Diriya Foundation and Manawa Sanwardena Sanvidanaya engaged in election monitoring proceedings. |
|
News | Business | Features
| Editorial | Security Produced by Lake House |
