Sri Lanka Supreme Court dismisses Fonseka's election malpractice petition without trial

Sri Lanka's Supreme Court today dismissed a petition filed by the former Army Commander and defeated presidential candidate Sarath Fonseka challenging President Mahinda Rajapaksa's reelection at the January 26 presidential elections.

The five-member bench upheld a preliminary objection raised on behalf of President Rajapaksa and rejected Fonseka's petition without being tried.
The common opposition candidate and the Democratic National Alliance (DNA) leader alleged that election malpractices took place during the January 26th presidential election and charged that the results were therefore unacceptable.

President Rajapaksa won the January presidential election with a wide margin of 18 percent equivalent to 1.8 million votes over Fonseka.

Fonseka challenging the election results asked the court to order the Election Commissioner to call a recount of the ballots in the presence of all 22 candidates who contested the January 26 presidential election this year.

President Rajapaksa on Monday submitted a motion to the Supreme Court to reject the petition submitted by Sarath Fonseka without trial.

In his submission, the President claimed that Fonseka's petition has been formulated in violation of the law and it had no basis and therefore, it should be rejected without a trial.