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Major presidential candidates fail to submit campaign finance details

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None of the four leading presidential candidates—current President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, former President Ranil Wickremesinghe, Sajith Premadasa, and Namal Rajapaksa—had made their campaign expenditure declarations as of Friday, in keeping with the campaign finance laws.

The parties and candidates were due to submit election expenditure details relating to last month’s presidential election today. However, as of Friday, the Election Commission  noted that only 13 of the 38 candidates had filed their accounts under the Election Expenditure Act No. 3 of 2023. The EC on Friday listed out the names of these candidates.

The Election Expenditure Act holds that all parties and independent candidates must submit records of the donors to their campaign within 21 days of the election results being announced. In conjunction with this Act, which was implemented for the first time since its enactment, a gazette detailing the stipulations around these submissions was published in August.

Accordingly, each candidate was permitted to spend up to Rs. 109 per voter for campaign activities, amounting to a total of 1,868.3 million rupees ($6 million). This marked another first for Sri Lanka’s election law, as a verifiable expenditure limit has not been in place before.

The EC said the report should include an estimated cost of all donations and contributions accepted or received in cash or kind by such recognised or other political party or candidate, stating whether they are donations, loans, advances, or deposits, as well as the “name, address, national identity card number, tax number (TIN), or the registration number of the donor, contributor, or the institution, incorporated or non-incorporated.”

Expenditure on media promotions, from printed handbills and banners to advertisements and broadcast programs, must be included in the submission.

The expenses for all media activities—handbills, posters, banners, pictures, advertisements, propaganda notices, radio and television shows, news bulletins, magazines, periodicals, social media, digital exposes, and any other digital media or publications—as well as the fuel supply for vehicles, regardless of whether payments were made or not, should be included in this report.

The Election Expenditure Act also requires all political parties that participate in the presidential election to include the tax payment information of individuals and companies that are funding presidential candidates.

Submitted records will be available for public viewing within two weeks of the deadline today. The EC had also noted, before the election, that those who failed to meet the deadline provided with accurate and honest information would be subject to the penalties prescribed in the Election Expenditure Act.

(The Sunday Times)

(This story, originally published by The Sunday Times has not been edited by SLM staff)

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Names of Mayors and Chairpersons of several LG bodies gazetted

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A gazette extraordinary has been issued containing the names of Mayors, Deputy Mayors, Chairpersons, and Vice-Chairpersons of several local government institutions.

The names have been gazetted based on recommendations sent to the National Election by political parties and independents groups that secured a majority in local government bodies at the recently concluded Local Government (LG) election.    

Accordingly, the Election Commission has taken steps to publish the names from among the political parties and independent groups that secured a majority at the Local Government election held recently.

The names of the elected and nominated members for the respective local authorities, following the Local Government election were also published in the government gazette based on the respective administrative districts.

As per the gazette notification issued by the Minister of Public Administration, Provincial Councils, and Local Government on February 17, 2025, the term of office of local government bodies is scheduled to commence on June 2, 2025

පළාත් පාලන ආයතනවල සභාපතිවරුන්ගේ නම් ඇතුළත් ගැසට් පත්‍රය නිකුත් කෙරේ by poornima

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Weather Alert: Showers to ease in Southwest, strong winds forecast in North

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Prevailing showery condition in the southwestern part of the island is expected to reduced gradually from today (01st)

Showers or thundershowers will occur at times in Western, Sabaragamuwa, Central and North-western provinces and in Galle and Matara districts.

Showers or thundershowers may occur at a few places in Uva province and in Ampara and Batticaloa districts during the afternoon or night.

Fairly strong winds of about (30-40) kmph can be expected at times over Western slopes of the central hills and in Northern, North-central and North-western provinces and in Hambantota and Trincomalee districts.

The general public is kindly requested to take adequate precautions to minimize damages caused by temporary localized strong winds and lightning during thundershowers.

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Aluthgamage and Fernando assigned printing work in prison

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Former Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage and former Sathosa Chairman Nalin Fernando, sentenced this week to jail for 20 and 25 years, respectively, have been assigned duties in the printing section at the Welikada prison, sources said.

Both of them are being held together away from the main section of the prison’s ‘chapel’ section, where prisoners serving life sentences and those convicted of murder and rape are held. The prison’s printing section prints its own documentation.

Prison sources said that in placing them in relevant wards to serve their jail term, the authorities had taken into consideration the security of the two convicts, as they might have had political enemies.

Mr Aluthgamage was handed a 20-year term of rigorous imprisonment, while Mr Fernando was given a 25-year term of rigorous imprisonment by a High Court trial-at-bar after being found guilty of causing a Rs 53 million loss to the state.

They were accused of importing carrom boards and checkers boards through Sathosa during the 2015 presidential elections and distributing them to clubs.

Their lawyers said yesterday they were awaiting the certified copy of the judgement to prepare the appeal papers. The appeal will be considered by the Supreme Court.

(sundaytimes.lk)
(This story, originally published by sundaytimes.lk has not been edited by SLM staff)

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