Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in Sri Lanka between 23 July and 23 August 2029. The election may be held earlier under exceptional circumstances if the incumbent president, after completing four years of his first term, issues a proclamation requesting a fresh mandate from the electorate to seek a second term.[1][2]
Background
The 2024 presidential elections were a three-way contest between Ranil Wickremesinghe, Sajith Premadasa, and Anura Kumara Dissanayake. In the first vote count, no candidate secured a majority. Dissanayake led with 42% of the vote, followed by Premadasa with 33%, while incumbent president Wickremesinghe finished third with 17%. As no candidate achieved a majority, a second round of vote counting was held for the first time in Sri Lanka's history under its limited ranked voting system. At the conclusion of this preferential vote count, Dissanayake was declared the winner, securing 55.89% of the vote. He was inaugurated on 23 September 2024.[3]
During the 2024 presidential election campaign, both Dissanayake and Premadasa promised that, if elected, they would abolish the executive presidential system and return the country to a parliamentary democracy. This familiar pre-election pledge has been made by many political leaders in the past, yet none have fulfilled it.[4]
According to Article 30 of the Constitution of Sri Lanka, the President of Sri Lanka is elected for a five-year term. Article 31 states that a person who has been elected president twice is ineligible to contest for a third term due to term limits.
The article also specifies that the presidential election must be held no less than one month and no more than two months before the incumbent president's term expires.
However, if the incumbent president wishes to seek a fresh mandate and a second term, they may issue a proclamation calling for early elections. This can be done any time after completing four years of their first term. By doing so, the president requests a new election before the full five-year term is completed, allowing the electorate to decide whether the president should continue for a second term.
The president is elected through a system of limited ranked voting. Voters can express up to three ranked preferences for the presidency. If no candidate receives more than 50% of all valid votes in the first count, all candidates except the two who received the highest number of votes are eliminated. The second and third preference votes of the eliminated candidates are then redistributed to the remaining two candidates until one of them secures an outright majority.[1][2]
This system remained unused until 2024. In every presidential election from 1982 to 2019, a candidate from one of the major parties or alliances consistently secured an outright majority in the first count.[3]
