JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — A former proxy to Sri Lanka’s defeated separatist Tamil Tiger rebels swept local council elections held in areas ravaged by the country’s 25-year civil war, officials said today, amid reports of intimidation and vote-buying.
The Elections Department said the Tamil National Alliance won 20 local councils out of the 25 it contested in the ethnic Tamil-majority north and east. President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance coalition secured five councils in Saturday’s vote.
The resounding victory consolidates the Tamil National Alliance’s status as an authentic representative of ethnic Tamils in negotiations with Rajapaksa’s ethnic majority Sinhalese-controlled government in sharing political power and postwar rehabilitation.
