PAFFREL accuses government of vote buying

By Rathindra Kuruwita

Election monitoring body People’s Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL) Friday said that the government was misusing state property at a time when a crucial election is only a few months away.

PAFFREL executive director, Rohana Hettiarachchi said that the government has launched a number of initiatives aimed at the coming presidential election. These initiatives, including the distribution of rice to the poor, is costing billions on tax payer rupees, he said.

“The government has allocated 10 million rupees for each local government area for development activities. The funds will be used at the discretion of the governor of the province. The governor is the direct

representative of the president and it is obvious that this is an endeavour aimed at the election,” he said.Hettiarachchi added earlier that the president has ordered officials to finish all government projects by July 31.

“The presidential election will be declared in August. This is why the government wants to finish projects by July 31. It spends billions of tax rupees as well as enormous physical and human resources of the state for its election activities. We are writing a letter to the Elections Commission to put an end to this,” he said.

The PAFFREL executive director said that the country is facing colossal economic crisis and that the government used this to postpone local government elections indefinitely. However, the government has enough money in its coffers to bribe the people ion view of the election, he said.