Sri Lanka's election commission said late on Sunday that Marxist-leading candidate Anura Kumara Dissanayake and his party had won general elections with 42.31% of the votes cast on Saturday. 

Sri Lanka authorities conducted a second round of counting for the first time in the country's history after top candidates failed to secure a majority solely from people's first-preference votes in the presidential race.

Dissanayake and opposition leader Sajith Premadasa had come out on top in the first round but neither won the mandatory 50% of first-preference votes necessary to be declared winner at the first count. 

Premadasa made up ground when counting voters' second preferences, but Dissanayake's initial lead proved unassailable as anticipated. 

Premadasa's party finished on 32.76% of the vote, results on the election commission website showed, ultimately almost 10% adrift. The final count including preferences gave a lead of just over 1.2 million votes for Dissanayake.

Turnout was put at almost 80%, with just over 13.6 million ballots cast in the island country.

Sri Lanka's instant run-off counting mechanism does not require a party to secure 50% support, only to maintain the lead after also counting other preferences. 

Dissanayake: 'This victory belongs to all of us'

"The dream we have nurtured for centuries is finally coming true," Dissanayake wrote on social media. 

He called the achievement "not the result of any single person’s work, but the collective effort of hundreds of thousands of you."

"The millions of eyes filled with hope and expectation push us forward, and together, we stand ready to rewrite Sri Lankan history," he said. 

Incumbent Wickremesinghe eliminated early

It was already clear after the initial vote count, announced earlier on Sunday, that all remaining candidates other than Dissanayake and Premadasa had been eliminated from contention.

The Election Commission told reporters that Wickremesinghe, who took office at the height of Sri Lanka's 2022 economic collapse and imposed tough austerity policies, would come a distant third. 

His party ultimately won just 17.27%.

What happens now?

Wickremesinghe did not immediately concede. However, Foreign Minister Ali Sabry said it appeared clear that Dissanayake had won.

"Though I heavily campaigned for President Ranil Wickremesinghe, the people of Sri Lanka have made their decision, and I fully respect their mandate for Anura Kumara Dissanayake," Sabry said on social media. 

Meanwhile, Vijitha Herath, a delegate from Dissanayake's party, said they were confident of victory but urged supporters to stay patient as the count went on.

"The Election Commission must complete the process of counting preference votes and that is what is delaying the final result," he said in a video message posted on social media.

Economic issues have been at the fore during an eight-week campaign. There has been widespread public anger over the hardships imposed since the crisis peaked two years ago.

Dissanayake has promised not to "tear up" the International Monetary Fund (IMF) deal that stipulated austerity as a precondition of economic help. However, he has said he intends to modify the terms under a provision to renegotiate.

Major gains since 2020 amid economic woes

Dissanayake's once-marginal party led two failed Marxist uprisings in the 1970s and 1980s in which some 80,000 people were killed.

In 2020's elections, it had won less than 4% support, but the economic downturn of the last four years proved an opportunity for it to make rapid gains.

Dissanayake has blamed the country's default on its debts in large part on a "corrupt" political culture in Sri Lanka, although geopolitical economic factors certainly also played a role. 

"Our country needs a new political culture," he said after casting his ballot on Saturday. 

rc, msh/sms (Reuters, AP)