2025 Local Government Election and future of local governance

UPCOMING 5 May, the Election Commission is preparing to elect more than 8,700 members to more than 330 local government bodies. Voters will be putting an X in front of the name and symbol of a party or independent group on their ballot paper. Will you as a voter pay attention to the person behind the party symbol when casting your vote? Or will you vote for a party which is riding a popularity wave or even a dissenting wave? Will the NPP be able to secure the 50% or more vote threshold that would mark the victory in this election?

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Answers to these questions and others will be known only after the 6th. For now, we have enough information to make other predictions. For example, the economic storm unleashed by US President Trump and sweeping the world is unlikely to abate despite recent pullbacks by same. The newly elected councils will be facing this economic storm from a weaker position than the central government, as I will outline later.

During his local government election campaign, specifically at Deiyandara and Weligama rallies, the President stated that his Government has worked hard to secure funds for the development of local government institutions and that the funds will be available for spending from June. At the same time, he said, jokingly or not we are sure, that with non-NPPERs not being trustworthy, the Government might consider development proposals from NPPers only.

Besides the inappropriateness of this statement during election time, what it reveals is that the present Government is no different than others before. For any governing Party, local authorities have been simply extensions of the central government that carry out the centre’s political agenda and are rewarded accordingly.

However, under the current economic conditions, if newly elected local councillors think they can depend on gifts from the big brother, they are in trouble. The central government will have enough trouble balancing its books and monies dedicated for spending at local level will be reduced significantly.

Therefore, it is the responsibility of the voters to elect local leaders who understand these realities and are able to find alternatives to diminishing subsidies from the central government. Why so and how so?

Weak institutions that depend on subsides from the centre