A.K. Dissanayake Leads in Presidential Election Voting Intent

Photo courtesy of The Leader

The Institute for Health Policy’s (IHP) Sri Lanka Opinion Tracker Survey (SLOTS) MRP provisional estimates of presidential election voting intent for August 2024 show NPP/JVP leader A.K. Dissanayake and SJB leader Sajith Premadasa led in voting preferences of all adults ahead of the September presidential election. None of the four major party presidential candidates had support of a majority of the adult voters. NPP/JVP leader A.K. Dissanayake led with 36% of all adults followed by SJB leader Sajith Premadasa with 32%, President Ranil Wickremesinghe with 28% and Namal Rajapaksa with 3%. Estimates are associated with margins of error of 3–7%.

Support for Ranil Wickremesinghe has been rising from March through August 2024 while there have been small declines in support for A.K. Dissanayake, Sajith Premadasa and SLPP during the same period.

IHP’s Executive Director, Dr Ravi Rannan-Eliya, commenting on the narrow race, said, “Our August polling indicates a tightening race in which no candidate will get close to half the vote on the first count. While this indicates that no candidate has succeeded in exciting a majority of voters, it also means that it is increasingly likely that the 2024 election will be the first presidential poll decided on a count of second and third preferences. We urge civil society and the Elections Commission to intensify efforts to educate voters about using their preferences to ensure that every vote counts.”

Analysis of the MRP model estimates for August reveal differences in the support base for each candidate. Support for A.K.Dissanayake was strongest among the youth with a majority (53%) supporting him and among Sinhala voters (42%). The most affluent third of voters (38%) supported both A.K. Dissanayake and Ranil Wickremesinghe. In contrast, Sajith Premadasa led among the poorest third of voters (40%).

More than half of Sri Lankan Tamils (55%) and Estate/Indian Tamils (53%) supported Sajith Premadasa while two-thirds of Muslims (71%) backed him. Ranil Wickremesinghe’s support increased with age, reaching 43% among those aged 60 years and older.

A.K. Dissanayake led in all provinces except the Northern and Eastern where he trailed in third place behind Sajith Premadasa and Ranil Wickremesinghe.

Both A.K. Dissanayake and Ranil Wickremesinghe drew a large part of their support from Gotabaya Rajapaksa 2019 voters with only one in eight of these voters backing Sajith Premadasa.

Further analysis of voting intent based on public opinion about the aragalaya shows that adults with favourable views of the aragalaya were more likely to support A.K. Dissanayake than those with an unfavourable view (37% versus 27%) in August. In contrast, Ranil Wickremesinghe and Namal Rajapaksa did better among those with a negative view of the aragalaya while Sajith Premadasa did equally well in both groups.

A comparable but weaker relationship was seen in relation to voters’ views about whether the rich-poor gap in the country is a good or bad thing. A.K. Dissanayake did 3 points better in those who thought the gap was bad versus those who thought it was good while Ranil Wickremesinghe did 4 points worse.

Dr. Rannan-Eliya commented, “Our polling indicates that overwhelming majorities of Sri Lankans have a favourable view of the Aragalaya and think that the poor-rich gap has been increasing in Sri Lanka and that this is bad. But it’s surprising that none of the leading candidates have been able to effectively tap into these sentiments with a winning message.”

These estimates use the IHP SLOTS Multilevel Regression and Poststratification (MRP) model. This update is for all adults and uses data from 19,721 interviews conducted from October 1, 2021 to September 2,  2024, including 1,153 interviews during August 2024. IHP has expanded its interview numbers in the weeks leading to the presidential election to provide better estimates.

IHP’s SLOTS MRP methodology first estimates the relationship between a wide variety of characteristics about respondents and their opinions, in this case, “If there was a Presidential Election today, who would you vote for?” in a multilevel statistical model that also smooths month to month changes.

SLOTS combines interviews from a national sample of adults (ages 18 and over) reached by random digit dialling of mobile numbers and others coming from a national panel of respondents who were previously recruited through random selection. IHP estimates voting intent using an adaptation of MRP with multiple imputation to account for uncertainties in its modelling, exploiting data from all SLOTS interviews to estimate voting in a particular month.

The August 2024 MRP estimates are based on 19,721 interviews conducted from October 1, 2021–September 2, 2024, including 1,153 interviews conducted in August 2024. All estimates are adjusted to ensure the sample matches the national population with respect to age, sex, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, education, geographical location, and voting in the 2019 presidential and 2020 general elections.