Advancing the presidential election

By 1982 doubts about the government's capacity to carry on its economic policies successfully had begun to grow. The immediate problem was the question of continued confidence in a country where the last six elections had all seen changes of government. Donors as well as investors were clearly nervous with an election due the following year.

It was advisable to settle the electoral question early. In addition, Jayewardene had during his long career observed that in Sri Lanka the unpopularity of a government in power increased dramatically towards the end of its tenure. Under the new constitution there was, of course, a new factor: two sets of elections were to be held, for the presidency and for parliament respectively. Thus a party that controlled both could continue to exercise power through one while elections to the other were being held. As things stood, parliament was due to be dissolved in July 1983, while a presidential election was due only a few months later, Jayewardene having elevated himself to the presidency as from February 1978 for a six year term. Such a gap would not have been enough to overcome the lame duck phenomenon.

The obvious course was to dissolve parliament early, and conduct these elections while Jayewardene was still president. But what he did instead was introduce yet another amendment to the constitution, to provide for an incumbent president to stand for re-election anytime after he had served four years in office, instead of going through with the fixed term of six years.