The Report of the Election Observations

By Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE)

February 03rd, 2010

1. The Introduction

Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE), as an Election Monitoring Organization
recognized by the Election Commissioner, engaged in election monitoring work from 2nd
December 2009 to 31 January 2010.

2. The Aims and the Principles of CaFFE

CaFFE is a group consists of Trade Unions, Religious Organizations, Civil Society

Organizations, Pressure Groups, Political Parties and concerned citizens, who stand for
campaigning for Free and Fair Elections. The group of election observers and the activists of CAFFE,
represent all the ethnic and religious groups in the country i.e., Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims and as well as the men
and women.

This group people associated with CaFFE voluntarily engaged in the election monitoring activities covering all the
aspects of the whole election. The District Network of CaFFE consists of the prominent personals in the respective
district and the people from out side the district as well. Many Social, Religious and Organizations in the district
too were among the CaFFE network. These people and the organizations, who value the democratic traditions and
values, got together with CaFFE to involve in the Election Monitoring.

The main emphasis of the CaFFE Election Monitoring was to observe the political, legal and technical aspects of the
whole election process and to comment on them, whether they are with in the accepted frame. It looked at the Rights
of the voters, Rights of the IDP s, maintaining the Law and Order, Protecting the Election Law, Role of the
Department of Election and its Officers, the performances of the Government Servants and also how the Media
institutions behave during the whole election period.

The approach of the CaFFE was to involve and observe all the actual election related happenings at the grassroots
level and to come up with its observations based on them. Therefore there was no pre-concluded or Political party
based information taken for consideration when concluding its observations.
CaFFE based their observations on the factual reports got from its observers at the grassroots levels and, it never go
by the baseless rumors. The report is prepared only after checking through various sources and only if they
confirmed. It was not only look at the immediate election environment but also looked at the various structures
involved in the whole election. It is therefore the report covers all the incidents took place during all the phases, pre-
election, election and post-election periods.

Therefore the report contains its observations covering all the aspects and in all the phases.

3. The Political Context

CaFFE believes that the present status of the Rule of Law in the country should be taken in to consideration when
engaged in the Election Observation. There are provisions in the 17 th Amendment of the Constitution, Parliament,
and Provincial Council and Local Government Election Laws to ensure a Free and Fair Election.

The government decided to have the Presidential Election before two years of its current term. It was decided after
securing a comfortable win in the Eastern, North-Central, Sabaragamuwa, Central, North-West, Uva and Southern
Provincial council elections. It was also a fact that the government was able to get the whole county under its
command, especially after ending the thirty years old war.

The government announced the presidential election, at the time, when over 40 members of parliament elected
through the UNP and 10 MP s elected from the JVP were with the governing party.

The media, especially the media institutions which carried the opinions of the opposition parties have imposed a self
censorship on them due to the suppression. There was hardly opposition opinions expressed and published in the
media. This is due to the killings, abductions, arrests, and charging the journalists and sentenced them in courts,
which also made some of them to leave the country. Some media institutions were set in fire. Even the websites
were subjected to various harassments. All these were led to having only one opinion, which are governments in
most of the media institutions.

4. Dissemination of information during the pre-election period

CaFFE was able to issue six News Letters in the last week of the pre-election period through electronic mails. The
information was given to the media through 21 Press Releases and by conducting 06 Press Conferences. The
information, the observations and the opinion of CaFFE were given on daily basis during this period. This
information covered the aspects of violation of the election laws, election violence, and misuse of state properties,
breakdown of the law and order and the behavior of the state owned media. CaFFE was able to issue reports which
cover the incidents of misusing of the state properties and the biased behavior of the state media before the election.

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They were published widely through electronic mails and other media. CaFFE has done a pioneering role in this
regard and the private media institutions have given a wide coverage for CaFFE reports. Apart from this the CaFFE
website constantly updated with information and with relevant photographs.

The CaFFE website was included in the collection of documents related to the Presidential Election 2010 in the
library of American Congress. This was for the first time that a Sri Lankan website related to the election monitoring
was accommodated in the collection in the American congress. Several foreign news agencies have quoted CaFFE
over 200 occasions. They were reported in the following websites.

http://news.search.yahoo.com/search/news;_ylt=A0WTTktNHGNLshEB9CvQtDMD;_ylu=X3oDMTBhNjRqazhxB
HNlYwNzZWFyY2g-?p=CaFFE+election+lanka&c=&ei=UTF-8&fr=&x=wrt

5. Pre-Election Observations

CaFFE covered all the districts in the country during the pre-election period. There were 178 observers from 1st
December to 25th December and more than 460 observers deployed from 26th December to 10th January and engaged
in the election observations. The number was increased as nearing the Election Day and 6563 observers engaged in
the election observation on the Election Day through out the country.

The District Offices of CaFFE were established in Jaffna, Vavuniya, Mannar, Hambantota, Batticaloa, Puttalam, and
Nuwara Eliya and in Anuradhapura helped close interactions with the grassroots level election observers. Due to the
lack of funds and resources, CaFFE was not able to establish District Officers in the other districts.

The Head Office of CaFFE analyzed the information obtained from the district offices, considering the context in
which the incident took place. CaFFE did its observations using wide eight aspects. They are as follows.

i. Whether The Law and Order maintained during the pre-election period?
ii. Whether The State Properties were misused?
iii. Whether The Election Laws were protected?
iv. How The State media behaved?
v. How the Election Department performed its duties?
vi. How the temporary identity cards were issued?
vii. How the rights of the IDPs were protected?
viii. What is the level of the awareness of the voters?

The maintains of the Law and Order

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CaFFE received 405 complaints under this category. It was reported 236 incidents of damaging properties, 166
cases of attacking and threatening people, 04 cases of killings, 89 cases of hospitalizations of victims after
assaulting/ hurting, 29 cases of violent incidents using firearms and 20 cases of attacking people by organized gangs.

CaFFE wishes to emphasize on the following aspects.

It was reported that special police teams were deployed to entertain the election related complaints made by the
people .These teams were personally supervised by the Senior Police officers. However there were no transparency
in entertaining and acting on the complaints and there were no reports of arrests made in connection with the
complaints.

Between the period from announcing the election to accepting nominations, there were violent incidents reported
from the Hambantota, Kurunegala, Gampaha and Puttalam districts.

It was noteworthy that there were more than 30 occasions that opposition parties complained that the Police was not
impartial and work according to the government politicians‟ orders and wishes. The opposition has leveled these
accusations against the Police Stations in Hambantota, Chilaw, and all the Police stations in Kurunegala district,
Matale, Nochchiyagama and Eppawela police stations in Anuradapura district, Gampaha, Monaragala,
Polonnaruwa, Batticaloa and Trincomalee.

The organized violence were took place in Hambantota, Anuradapura, Gampaha, Polonnaruwa and Puttalam.

There were violent incidents in the other districts too. But they were unorganized and inconsistence in nature.

The Police was trying to refer to these pre-election violent incidents as „minor incidents‟. The Police charged that
the Election monitoring groups were trying to report these incidents in a bigger way, but in the same time the police
have failed to establish its charge.

Most of the cases of violent incidents were charged against the UPFA supporters and the complaints were made by
the supporters of Gen Sarath Fonseka.

According the Police, there were 958 cases of violent incidents reported and they have made 412 arrests.

CaFFE noted that the commitment of the relevant authorities and the officers in inquiring these complaints was very
low. This situation was eminent in the Hambantota, Polonnaruwa, Anuradapura and Kurunegala districts and there
were attacks to seven election offices of Gen Sarath Fonseka in one day in the Polonnaruwa District. It was reported
that between 1st and 10th January, 16 election offices of the UNP and JVP were destroyed in Hambantota District.

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6. Misuse of State Properties

CaFFE received 139 complaints with regard to the misuse of State Properties during the pre-election period and it
was 280 at the end of the election.

CaFFE issued a detailed report on the misuse of state properties on 22 nd January.

UPFA supporters have used almost all the state properties for their election campaign. They have extensively used
state media and the vehicles belonging to the state institutions. The properties of the state institutions such as the Sri
Lanka Port Authority, Road Development Authority, Foreign Employment Bauer, University Grants Commission,
Sri Lanka Transport Board, National Youth Service Council and the Police Department were visibly and openly
misused by the UPFA supporters for their election campaign.

Apart from this, the properties and the resources belong to the institutions of Samurdhi Authority, Agriculture,
Livestock, Plantation and Education Ministries were misused by the UPFA supporters. Samurdhi, NYSC and the
Education ministry were among the leading institutes which supplied the Human resources for the UPFA election
campaign.

7. Violation of Election Laws

There were 242 incidents reported with regard to the violation of election laws during the pre-election period.

8. Illegal Propaganda Activities

The illegal propaganda activities were the common violation of the election law occurred during the whole
campaign. Both the main candidates were started to exhibit their Banners, Cut-outs, and posters in a wide scale.

However most of the violations were done by the UPFA supporters. The removing of the illegal posters, cut-outs
etc, by the Police were mostly applied for the Opposition candidate.

It was reported that the supporters of the main Opposition candidate have engaged in destroying the cut-outs of the
UPFA candidate. The cut-outs of the UPFA candidate displayed between Nittambuwa and Kegalle (January 5/6),
from Panadura to Ambalangoda (January 5), in some selected places on Negambo- Colombo road (January 6) were
destroyed by the supporters of the oppression candidate. With these incidents, it was seen that the Police guard was
deployed to protect the cut-outs of the UPFA candidate. These police guards were deployed by the Kandy,
Katugastota, Kadugannawa, Puttalam, Chilaw, Anuradhapura, Nochchiyagama, Eppawela, Monaragala and all the
Police stations in Hambantota and six Police stations in Kurunegala district ,Rattota in Matale district, Gampaha,
Nittambuwa, Kelaniya, Divlapitiya and Katana.

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9. Entertaining Voters at the Temple Trees

Several and different professional groups, Trade Unions, Civil Society Organizations, Business groups and ethnic
groups were entertained at the Temple Trees. The Oppression Political Parties protested against this act and as a
result the Election Commissioner sent his recommendations to the President‟s Secretary in this regard. However
this was continued at the Temple Trees and at The Bandaranayake Memorial Hall.

10. Pledge to Increase the Salaries of the Government servants

Both the main candidates, Gen Sarath Fonseka and Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse promised to increase the salaries of the
government servants by Rs 10000/ and 2500/ respectively, in order to attract the votes.

11. Voter Education Programme

For the last 26 years there were no voters education activity in the North. The level of the awareness with regard to
the „right of voting‟, marking the ballot paper and obtaining the ID cards etc .were at the very low level among the
voters in the North.

CaFFE conducted several programs to make the voters aware and the Tamil News papers published in the North
gave their fullest support for this. These programs covered the aspects such as the legal provisions for pasting
posters, obtaining TIC s, the duties of the Polling Agents etc.

The Jaffna News Papers, “Udayan”, “Valampuri” and “Thinakural” gave their fullest support and assisted to educate
the voters.

12. The Behaviors of the State Media Institutions

CaFFE issued two separate reports during the election period on the misuse of the State Media Institutes. The second
report attached to this report for further reading.

All the state media institutions in the country, the Sri Lanka Rupavahini Corporation (SLRC), Independent
Television Network (ITN), Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC), Lakhanda and the Lake House misused
their resources , air time, programs, feature articles/programs, News and the publications in a maximum and
unaccepted level for the Election Campaign of the UPFA.

These were seen also as the attempts beyond the „election propagandas‟ and aimed at mud slinging against the main
opposition candidate.

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CaFFE issued a report and pointed out as how these Media Institutions violated the guidelines issued by the Election
Commissioner on the usage of media during an election period.

13. The performance of the department of Elections

.
Issuing Temporary Identity Cards

According to the voter register of 2008, there were no identity card numbers written in front of the names of 1.9
million voters. Out of these voters, CaFFE believes that some of the voters may have at least one sort of identity
card to prove their identity. Thus about 1.2 million to 1.5 million voters may not have any sort of identity card.

The Department of Registrations of Persons and the Department of Elections working separately to issue the
Temporary Identity Cards (TIC) for these voters. Accordingly, the Department of Registrations of Persons and the
Department of Elections have printed TIC s 2.6 million and one million respectively. Hence the transparency of the
whole process of issuing TIC s has become an issue and a concern.

CaFFE has drawn the attention of the Election Commissioner on this matter and protested against utilizing the
politically appointed officers such as Samurdhi Officers and Govi Niyamakas in the process of issuing TICs. As the
Political Parties too protested against this involvement, the Election Commissioner took steps to remove these
officers from this work.

CaFFE, during the Eastern Provincial Council Elections revealed that there were some fake TICs issued to some
people. As the Commissioner announced that the TICs issued for the Provincial Council Election in the East, are not
valid for the Presidential Election, we believe that the Commissioner too has accepted this.

CaFFE in a letter to the Election Commissioner drew his attention for the following issues.

1. The other officers at the Divisional Secretariats, apart from the Divisional Secretary and the Administrative
Officer are been involved in the process of issuing the TICs.
2. These officers though attached to the DS, are paid by the other Ministries and from Special Projects,
particularly in Nuwara Eliya, Puttalam, Badulla, Mannar, Anuradhapura, Kurunegala, Ampara, Batticaloa
and Jaffna Districts are involve in the process of issuing TICs.

In this circumstances it can not be ruled out the possibility of a fraud in issuing the TICs

Therefore we urge you to consider of taking following steps.

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 a. To publish a list containing the names of the people who obtained the TICs so far and the Polling
Centers at which they are supposed to exercise their ballots.
b. In order to verify whether there was an „organized move‟ of obtaining the TICs, we urge you to
keep all the applications under the custody of Your Department and conduct a random check on some
of these applications before the Election to verify the bona fides.
c. To check whether the TICs have issued for the people who are in foreign countries particularly in
the Eastern Province.
d. To check whether the TICs are issued for the Internally Displaced Persons lived in Puttalam and
more importantly, whether for the same persons other TICs are issued in Jaffna, Mannar, and Vavuniya
and in Puttalam districts.

CaFFE made a request to the Election Commissioner to take the following steps to safeguard the rights of the voters
who do not have a proper identity card.

a. To have a random check on the applications

b. To publish a list of the Names who obtained the TICs with the Names of the relevant Polling
Centers
c. To cancel the TICs issued for the persons who do not have their names in the voting list
d. To remove /cancel the TICs, if issued, for the Dead People and the persons who are in foreign
countries.

The Department of Election accepted most of the facts forwarded by CaFFE and took steps to prepare a list of
names of those who obtained a TIC. In addition to this they took steps to forward the application form (Which
submitted by the applicant to get a TIC) to the polling centers. In the same time the Election Commissioner directed
the SPOs to retain the TIC after the voter exercise his/her ballot.

These steps helped to minimize the rigging or malpractices in voting using the TICs.

However CaFFE noted that the attention of the Political Parties in this issue was at a very low level. Except for
Matara, Badulla and Puttalam districts, in all the other districts the opposition political party leaders were not
bothered even to check the relevant lists.

Appoint a Competent Authority to look in to the matters in the Media Institutions

As a result of the requests made by the Political Parties and the Election Monitoring groups to the Election
Commissioner, he was able to issue 21 guidelines on 17th December advising as how the media institutions should
act during an election period. Responding to a query made by CaFFE, the Election Commissioner promised to
appoint a Competent Authority to look in to the behaviors of the media institutions, if the parties concerned are not

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satisfied with the usage of the guidelines by the media institutions. The Secretary General of UNP, Mr. Tissa
Attanayake issued a statement after the meeting of the Political Party leaders with the EC, on 29th December, which
got the wide publicity on the behavior of the media institutions.

However, the Competent Authority got 5-6 days to start his duties and in fact he started his work on 5 th January.

It was reported that the CA has issued several directives which were not published, to the media institutions. By this
time the EC has ordered to stop five programs telecasted by SLRC, though these programs were telecasted with
other titles.

The EC at a meeting with the Political party leaders expressed his dissatisfaction with regard the whole affairs with
the media institutions and stated he will take steps to call back the CA, as there is no point in keeping him as the
media institutions are not responding to his directives. It was clearly visible that the EC was under enormous
pressure.

Transfers of the Government Officers

After announcing the Election, the EC has issued an order preventing the transfers of the State Officers on 7 th
November. However there were many transfers made violating this order especially in the North-Central province.
The Teacher Trade Union leaders were transferred to other places in this province.

It appeared that the Police Department has got the approval of the EC to transfer the Senior Superintendent of Police
(SSP) Mr. Jayawardena from Ampara to Killinochchi. CaFFE protested to this action and pointed out that the
transfer is politically motivated. CaFFE believes that this type of transfers could adversely effect to the whole
process of the election. As a result of the protest staged by CaFFE and other concerned organizations, the Police
Department had to cancel the transfer.

Following this incident, in the night on 2nd January some of the Police Officers have taken steps to remove the
illegal cut-outs and banners. It clearly showed that these officers had faith on the EC for performing their duties in
accordance with the election laws.

The information was flooded of this type of illegal transfers and, in one such occasion, the civil organizations were
able to stop the appointment of the Chairman of the Sugarcane Corporation.

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Ensuring the Rights of the Voters

Even though the election was announced soon after ending the war, there were no steps to safeguard the voting
rights of the IDPs. Though there were many people above 18 years of age, they were not included in the voter
registers.

There were many areas in Jaffna and Vanni districts, where the voter registers were not updated after 1986.

The names of the people who are already died, who have left the country and who live with their relatives in other
areas were not removed from the voter registers and they were still included.

Most of the voters in these areas were denied their right to vote, as the voter registers were not properly updated.
This situation is seen as a peculiar situation, which is not seen in the other areas of the country.

The Rights of the vote of the IDPs

CaFFE was constantly interacting with the relevant authorities with regard to safeguard the Rights of the voters
among the IDPs. Some of the concerns and the issues taken were as follows.
1. The actual numbers of voters live in the IDP camps and whether they have any kind of ID
cards.
2. The numbers of people re-settled from the Camps and whether they have any kind of ID
cards.
3. The IDPs live outside their original electorate and the facilities provided for them for
casting their votes.
4. Establishment of „Cluster Polling Centers‟, its mechanism and the facilities provided for the
voters to cast their votes.
5. The transport facilities arranged for the IDPs to cast their votes.
6. The status and the progress of issuing TICs to the IDP s and numbers of applications
received and number of TICs issued.
7. The officers deployed to work in the Polling Centers and are they Tamil Speaking Officers?

By the time that CaFFE started to inquire about these IDPs, it noted that there were 84,500 people who are above 18
years live in 9 IDP Camps. The resettlement process was accelerated soon after the announcement of the Election.

The Election Department originally decided to establish 17 Polling Centers for the IDPs and it was reduced to 9
centers by 26th January. However the voting was taken place only in 7 centers on the Election Day. The Polling
centers were established in the Manik Farm Camp at the Aravithottam Maha Vidyalaya. According to the EC, only
16,973 voters were eligible for voting at these centers.

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14. Summary of the Observations in the Pre-Election period

CaFFE involved in Election Monitoring work as an accepted group by the EC. CaFFE was invited for all the
meetings with the Political party Leaders and CaFFE interacted with the Election Department through telephone and
through letters almost every day.
The report was based on the information obtained by CaFFE during the whole election period.

CaFFE presents its observations as follows.

1. CaFFE observes that the Election was held in a situation where the full Constitutional
framework for the Election process was not enforced. The Independent Election Commission, the
Police Commission and the Public Service Commission which were created by the 17th Amendment
of the Constitution to guarantee a free and fair election were not activated. Thus it is difficult to
expect an impartial involvement of the public servants. It was very clear that most of the Police
Officers had to carry out the orders of the Politicians in the area. The Government Officers too were
adversely influenced by them, thus disturbed the environment which should conducive to have a
free and fair election
2. It was clearly visible that the Police Department had work in accordance with the wishes of the
Politicians of the Governing party. The advantage of the absence of the Independent Police
Commission was capitalized by these politicians for their own ends. It was visible that the UNP and
JVP politicians were not given the proper police protection. With regard to the security aspects of
the Presidential candidates, Gen Fonseka it was clear that the security arrangements were not
adequate with few security personals and it was highlighted at several occasions.
3. It was reported that the complaints made by the Opposition political parties were not
entertained by the Police. This situation is visible in the Hambantota, Anuradapura, Polonnaruwa,
Monaragala, Kurunegala and Puttalam districts.
4. During the pre-election period, 412 violent incidents were reported. This is a high proportion
compare to the previous elections. It is also high in the intensity and the organized manners of the
incidents. It was reported that over 90 people were hospitalized due to physical attacks and 28
incidents reported where the firearms used. There was reports everyday, of damaging the election
offices of the opposition parties by armed gangs. Till the second week of January, most of the
complaints were against the UPFA. But after the second week the UPFA offices were too attacked
by the opposition parties.
5. Most of the complaints were against the UPFA and they were made by the JVP and UNP
supporters.
6. The programs conducted by the Election Department to educate the voters were seen as a
minimal effort.
7. It was also reported that the National Identity Cards were forcibly taken from the people before
two days to the election.

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 8. The relevant government officers were not keen to take back the vehicles belonging to the state
institutions, even after the reports and complaints made pointing out that they are misusing for the
election campaign of the UPFA. Many of the state institutes denied the chargers leveled against them
by the Transparency International which charged them for misusing their properties for the election
campaign. But after CaFFE proved them through the media, the state institutes kept their silence. It
is also seen that some of the government officers were freely allowed the state properties to be taken
away and utilized for the election campaigns.
9. The election propaganda and the campaign in the North seen dull and the attention to secure the
voting rights of the IDPs was also seen very low.
10. Most of the public servants especially attached to the Road Development Authority, National
Youth Service Council, Port Authority and the Education Department were deployed to campaign
for the candidate of the governing party.

15. The Postal Election

There were 19 complaints received by CaFFE with regard to the Postal Election. The Serious issue was reported
from the Rattota Police Station. The Police Officers stated through affidavits that the OIC of the Rattota Police
Station has influenced them in casting their ballots.

The illegal propaganda was common in most of the Postal voting centers. There were several incidents reported in
the SLTB Depots.

Some of the voters after exercising their postal votes have received the polling cards by post. CaFFE informed this
incident to the EC through a confidential report. The ARO of Nuwara Eliya has advised the relevant officers through
telephone (Example Health Department) not to reveal this incident to the Election Monitors.

There were 401,118 voters eligible for the postal votes and 394,125 voters have exercised their ballots. This records
a 98.25% of turnout.

CaFFE has issued a separate report on the Postal Voting.

16. Distance Voting Facilities Provided for IDPs

The IDPs from the Northern and Eastern Provinces, who live in different places, were provided Distance Voting
facility. The IDPs live in Jaffna, Vanni, Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Ampara districts got this facility. There were
48,000 voters who applied for this facility and only 45,732 were allowed to vote. The low number of IDP voters
recorded due to the complicated and the long procedure involve in this registration process.

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However some of the voters live in Mannar, Vavuniya and Jaffna districts have submitted more than one application
for registration. The EC stated that the information and the signatures are different in the two applications. The
Election department took steps to reject these applications to avoid any malpractice.

17. The Observations on the Election Day

The observations of CaFFE on the Election Day were based on the two elements. They are,
1. The incidents reported by the CaFFE Observers.
2. The situation prevailed in and out side of the Polling Centers.

The incidents took place on the Election Day reported were the physical assaults, casting other people‟s votes and
disrupting the voters in an organized manner. It was also reported, that some of the groups were attempted to create
an atmosphere which is not conducive for voting peacefully in an organized manner.

CaFFE did its observations through 6563 observers and some mobile units at the polling centers, IDP camps, Cluster
Polling centers and at the Counting Centers. It also observed the behavior of the state media and all the other aspects
of the election

CaFFE took steps to deploy special teams for the centers that identified as the centers which needs special attention.
CaFFE was able to deploy such teams to all the polling centers in the North except for only six centers. CaFFE was
not able to deploy the adequate number of observers to the other districts as it wishes, due to the lack of resources.
The commitment of the social activists who gave their fullest support in those districts should be noted with sense of
gratitude.

CaFFE was able to visit most of the places, though in some places it was hampered as the EC was not permitted the
CaFFE observers to enter in to the Polling Centers. Despite this, most of the officers involved in the Election duties
rendered their fullest support for the observations.

Most of the Political Parties, the Civil Society Organizations and also the Police Officers gave CaFFE voluble
information with regard to conducting a free and fair election.

The Officers of the Election Department have arranged all the facilities to conduct a free and fair election. The
transportation of the ballot boxes, stationeries, non sensitive documents were done in an optimum level.

CaFFE is satisfied with the way in which the EC took steps to deliver the „sensitive documents‟ to his officers all
over the country. All the Polling Centers came under observation of CaFFE, started the polling at 7.00 am and
concluded at 4.00 p.m. as scheduled. There was no a single complain received during the voting time. The armed
police teams were deployed in and out sides of the polling centers and they have maintained the peaceful

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atmosphere conducive to conduct a free and fair election. The police did not allow the groups to loaf around the
polling centers.

However, the organized groups were seen loafing around the polling centers in Nawalapitiya, Hanguranketha,
Puttalam, Dambulla, Mahiyanganaya, Ampara, Anuradapura and Polonnaruwa districts.

It was seen that the elderly and handicapped people were assisted by the officers attached to the polling centers. It
was evident that the officers were well trained to perform their duties. There were Tamil speaking officers deployed
in the polling centers in the North and in the East. How ever, the officers deployed in the polling centers for IDPs in
Settikulam and Ullukkulam and in seven polling centers at Aravithottam Maha Vidyalaya seen as officers with less
experience. There were some problems erupted in Puninn in Killinochchi as a result of deploying inexperience
officers.

According to the CaFFE observation, it was noted that in most of the polling Centers, in all the districts there were at
least 3 polling agents present. There was a shortage of such polling agents in the polling centers in Killinochchi,
Vavuniya, and Mullaittivu and Jaffna districts.

The Polling agents of JVP, were subjected to a screening at the Iratteperiyakulam Police Road Block in Vavuniya,
thus, were not able to go to the polling centers in time.

Some observers of CaFFE too, who were heading to Killinochchi and Mullaittivu had to limit their journey due to
the same reason.

CaFFE noted that only few polling agents were got some training to fulfill their responsibilities. Most of them were
not aware of the status and situations to deal with such as, the issues with regard to the TICs, sealing the ballot boxes
with a plastic cover, travel with the ballot boxes in the same vehicle and the steps should take while the ballot boxes
are transporting.
CaFFE noted that the confidential nature of the ballot papers was well secured. The step taken by the EC to put the
ballot box in a transparent plastic cover was a progressive step. The polling agents were seen taking steps efficiently
to transport the ballot boxes with the police security. The step taken by the EC to allow the polling agents to travel
with the ballot boxes is praiseworthy. In the same time there were arrangements for the polling agents to protect and
be with the ballot boxes till the counting started. However in some places the polling agents were disrupted at the
Road blocks.

18. The need of an Identity Card

The system of Identity Card introduced to prevent the malpractices at an election. But, contrary to this, this
protective measure has become a barrier for some people. The people, who do not have a proper ID, are not keen in
getting a TIC only for the purpose of casting their votes.

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Nevertheless, CaFFE endorse the measure of introducing the ID card as a positive step to curb any malpractices.

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