UPFA nudging 2/3rds - Survey

Nadira GUNATILLEKE

The United People's Freedom Alliance (UPFA) will obtain 65 percent of the total votes at the upcoming Parliamentary Election and it will win a total of 145 or146 seats in Parliament, a recent survey conducted by the Kelaniya University reveals. The same University conducted a similar survey prior to the recent Presidential Election and predicted the result which was almost hundred percent accurate.

According to Kelaniya University Mass Communication Department Senior Lecturer Dr Rohana Lakshman Piyadasa the UPFA will obtain close to two thirds of the seats in the Parliament at the upcoming election.

The survey results clearly show that the UPFA will get 65 percent of the total votes and accordingly will get 129 seats in Parliament. Another 16 or 17 National List seats to be added to this number will make it 145 or 146.

The forecast has a margin of error of five percent. Dr Piyadasa pointed out that the UNP will obtain around 28 percent of the total votes and accordingly it will obtain 55 seats in Parliament at the upcoming General Election.

The number of seats to be obtained by other political parties is only 12. Majority of those 12 seats will be obtained by the Tamil political parties in the North and East. According to the survey results 5 seats in the Jaffna district, 3 seats in the Batticaloa district and 2 seats in the Vanni district will be won by the other political parties.

According to Dr. M.M. Gunatilleke of the Kelaniya University, a group of 300 well-trained undergraduates from the University of Kelaniya, University of Jaffna, Eastern University and other universities collected data from a sample of 16,000 voters belonging to all age groups, ethnicities, social groups and provinces covering 22 districts. Fifty percent of them were males and 50 percent were females.

Two thirds of them were youths. The voters belonged to both State and private sector. The survey conducted from March 11 to 23 was funded by the Kelaniya University.

According to Dr. Ajith Dissanayake of Kelaniya University 37 percent of the respondents believe that it is television which makes the strongest impact on the upcoming General Election.

While 39 percent think it is posters and cut-outs. About 35 percent of the respondents said that it is unemployment which is the main problem of Sri Lanka. Another 35 percent said it is infrastructure facilities. Only 15 percent said it is malpractice and corruption.

Three percent said that the Government took very good action against this and 14 percent said the actions was good. 15 percent said the action was very poor.

The voters are less interested in voting in the upcoming General Election when compared to the recent Presidential Election.

A majority of them wanted to change the existing system to the previous (electoral) system. But unfortunately they do not understand that it is their vote which is helping to change the existing system.