2024 Sri Lankan presidential election

The 2024 Sri Lankan presidential election was the ninth presidential election in the country’s history and was held on 21 September 2024. Incumbent President Ranil Wickremesinghe ran for re-election as an independent candidate, making him the first sitting president to run for re-election since Mahinda Rajapaksa in 2015. Other prominent candidates included Leader of the Opposition Sajith Premadasa, Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the NPP, and Namal Rajapaksa, son of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. The election was a three-way contest between Wickremesinghe, Premadasa and Dissanayake. The first vote count concluded with no candidate winning a majority. Dissanayake won a plurality of the vote with 42.31%, followed by Premadasa with 32.76%. Incumbent president Wickremesinghe finished third, winning only 17.27% of the vote. Since no candidate won a majority, a second round of vote counting was held for the first time in Sri Lanka's history under its limited ranked voting system. The following day, Dissanayake was declared the winner, winning 55.89% of the vote in the second round. He was inaugurated on 23 September. The election signified a major political realignment in Sri Lanka. Dissanayake's victory was the first time a third-party candidate was elected president. This was also the first election where neither of the top two candidates were endorsed by the United National Party or the Sri Lanka Freedom Party.