Sri Lankas’ 2024 Presidential Election Rankings by District
From SLELECT.NET – Contributors A. Wijesiri, S. Sasna, D. Kulasooriya, A. Keerthana and ZL Mohamed.
Introduction
We visualize how major candidates were able to place within the first 4 places in different districts in Sri Lnaka’s Presidential poll conducted on September 21, 2024. There were five candidates who placed in the first four and then the other 34 candidates did not place even close to the other five are. The five candidates who were Anura Kumara Dissanayake (AKD / NPP), Sajith Premadasa (SP/SPS), Ranil Wickramasinge (RW/NDF), Namal Rajapaksa (NR / SLPP) and Ariyanethiran Pakkiyaselvam (AP/DTNA) polled 42.3%, 32.8%, 17.3%, 2.6%, 1.7% respectively of the national vote. Those placed below them did not reach 1%.
Interpretation
First Rank
AKD secured the first place in 15 districts in the Western, Southern, North-Central, Sabragamuwa, North-Western Provinces and in the districts of Kandy and Matale. The remaining 7 “districts” were won by SP’s coalition in the Northern and Eastern districts and in Nuwara Eliya and Badulla Districts. Note, the Elections department has decided that Killinochchi shall belong to Jaffna and the Mannar, Mullaitivu and Vavuniya Districts shall be called Vanni.
Second Rank
SP has secured second place all the districts where he did not secure first place. AKD, RW and AP have secured second place in three districts each.
Third Rank
RW secured third place in almost all the districts with 4 exceptions. In Mannar, Vavuniya, Batticaloa, third place was secured by AP while in Nuwaraeliya, third place was secured by AKD.
Fourth Rank
NR has achieved fourth place in 17 districts. In Eastern province and Vavuniya, fourth place was secured by AP while AKD won fourth place in remaining Northern districts.
Summary
Overall,
- AKD has secured first place in 15 districts and second place in three more districts and the third place in Nuwara Eliya and fourth places in Jaffna and Vanni districts.
- Overall AKD has placed first in districts where the minority populations were lower than 40%
- SP’s coalition achieved first place in 7 district and second place the remaining 15 districts.
- RW’s coalition places second or third place in all districts . AP has achieved places ranging from second to fourth place in all the Northern and Eastern districts, highlighting the regional influence.
- AP’s coalition ranked 2nd in Jaffna, 3rd place in the Vanni and Batticaloa and 4th place in Ampara and Trincomalee.
- NR’s coalition has only fourth places in appears to be the weakest; lacking any first, second or third place wins.
- The fourth ranked candidates would not have made it to the 5% cut off if this were a parliamentary elections in 5 districts: the districts of Hambantota, Batticaloa, Trincomalee, Vanni and Jaffna.
- There is a marked regional pattern – the places where AKD has placed best overlaps with places where Gotabaya Rajapaksha / SLPP coalition did best in the 2020 elections.
