Sri Lanka will hold elections for a new president on September 21, the government said, quoted by Reuters. The agency notes that the elections will be of key importance for the future of reforms in the South Asian island nation, which is experiencing its worst financial crisis in decades, cited by BTA.
Candidates for the election must be submitted by August 15, according to the government statement. Incumbent Ranil Wickremesinghe, 75, is expected to run for another term.
Wickremesinghe took office two years ago after widespread protests sparked by a financial crisis in the country of 22 million people forced his predecessor Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee Sri Lanka and resign.
He was elected by parliament to complete the five-year term of Rajapaksa, who won the election in November 2019. The current president was able to rebuild the country's economy with the help of a $2.9 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout program , reducing inflation from 70% in September 2022 to 1.7% in June, strengthened the national currency and restored the previously destroyed foreign exchange reserves.
Sri Lanka's economy is expected to grow by 3% in 2024, after contracting by 2.3% last year and by 7.3% at the height of the crisis. However, higher taxes imposed because of the IMF program, prolonged inflation and a stagnant labor market led to poverty for a quarter of the population and forced thousands of people to migrate.
Opposition leader Sajith Premadasa and MP Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who heads the Marxist Janata Vimukti Peramuna party, are expected to capitalize on the discontent during their election campaigns. Both have publicly stated that they will request a review of the IMF program to reduce pressure on the local population and ease the burden of repaying the country's debt.