so why did ranil lose? and buffalo win?

at the moment few theories are flying about.

in a mostly positive forward looking post, this is what indi has to say,

Ranil lost not because his policies are bad or unsuccessful, but because they simply weren’t communicated. He lacked the language and frames to structure his ideas, so his accomplishments just hung in the air... UNP had no talking points, no message discipline, no coherent branding, and no comprehensible theme. Part of this is because the media unit is rephrehensibly bad and Ranil isn’t the most brandable of candidates. Moreso, it’s because there is no intellectual infrastructure to support his policies...'

in unp's own blog some (moderated) comments place the blame on branch organizers who expected a easy win because of minority support and thus neglected basic campaigning work.

but i have to disagree, numbers do not support both these arguments, as i have already commented elsewhere unp's vote tally increased in this election from 40.39% in 2004(including slmc and ucpf) to 48.4% (by 8.01% , 952,105 in votes) that is a very very good swing. both the unp(in 2000 to 2001) and the upfa (in 2001 to 2004) were able to change governments using a 7.5% or less swings in votes.

in my scenario calculation before the election, i put forward what i thought could be the minimum requirements for ranil to win. three of the requirements were 2.5% swing from upfa, additional 1.5% from ppl who stayed away in 2004, and a third of jhu vote(i.e.2% from total 6%) going to unp. in other words a addition of 6% to the unp total in the south. in a situation where 75% of the 2004 tna voters stayed away that would have been enough for a win.

but that crucial fourth requirement did not materialize 25% of tna voter did not vote. in most northern polling divisions less than 0.1% voted. i thought i was being conservative when i included only 25% (based on the fact over 30% voted in the postal voting held last week) but i was wrong.

most of the tamils in north decided to follow ltte's wishes of their own free will. may be they were afraid for their lives as some ppl argue, but while we can excuse ppl living in ltte controlled areas, we have no such excuse for ppl living in government controlled areas. they just obeyed the ltte because of some vague fears quite forgetting that there is security in large numbers. even if ltte killed a few afterwards using its clandestine units that operate in those areas, most had nothing to fear seriously. they would have done better to reflect on the consequences and deaths in a restarted war.
ppl who do not exercise or demand their rights do not deserve them. ppl in the south who voted in 1988 election inspite of jvp boycott backed up by real killings showed how real democrats should act on such a occasion.

so the main reason why ranil wickremasinghe was defeated and mahinda rajapakse the buffalo( i will continue to refer to him that way in the future till he gets lame) won is clear, ltte wanted it that way and tamils in northeast obliged.

so why does ltte want the buffalo as president?

is it because they want a weak leader in the south ? probably, and they have achieved it. buffalo has to depend on the jvp and jhu even more than cbk. with those ppl in government it will never be strong

is it because they expect the buffalo to start a war? so that
1, ltte leadership can get a firmer control of their organization that has been slowly slipping through their fingers?
2, so that ltte can get the sympathy of international community and the various peacenik ngos?
well they won't get that. government is more or less broke so mahinda can't start a war even if he wanted to. ltte will have to do that by large scale provocations, which i expect them to do after 27th. but that will mean they will have to do without the sympathy and probably at the risk of getting more and more of it's front organizations getting banned in more and more countries for helping terrorists.
nor will they be able to maintain their bases in most of the east, government backed karuna faction will have a field day.

is it because of some remarks by milinda moragoda and navin dissnayake as alleged by some?
that is certainly not the case. what they said ( that ltte is trapped in the peace process and is getting progressively weaker and unp planned that in advance ) was common knowledge to those who were interested in the peace talks. one intention of the the interim administration and the p-toms etc. was the desire to make the ltte a dependent of the government, or failing that of the international community, for money. ltte knew that too, it's very clear from their own proposal for these structures. maybe only jvp, jhu and buffalo were clueless.

whatever the exact (and imo highly dicey) reason, we will know soon enough, as the ltte has only few options left.

did ranil made a mistake by appealing to all communities, especially the tamils and running on a peace platform? no, imo. after all even without the ltte and it's followers he got 48.4% of the vote. and buffalo won by just 28,600 odd majority and a 181,000 lead.
that a slim majority in south and almost all ppl in the north chose war, does not make it the wrong policy. war is always bad policy in my book.

unfortunately, most ppl decided in favor of war, on their own free will, at the ltte's urging and elected the president ltte wanted. they will get what they deserve.