The Elections Commission wants direct intervention by the government to conduct provincial council polls before the presidential election and has sought a meeting with President Maithripala Sirisena to take a final decision on this matter.

Election Commission Chairman, Mahinda Deshapriya, told the Daily Mirror yesterday that the EC met Speaker Karu Jayasuriya on May 9 and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on the 16th and discussed the possibility of holding PC polls before the presidential election expected by the year end.

“They told us that they did not want to postpone PC elections and stressed that parliament will have to expedite the process to conduct early elections. The Prime Minister will meet party leaders in on Tuesday to discuss the issue and take a final decision,” he said.

Commenting on the Easter Sunday attacks and the subsequent ethnic riots, Mr. Deshapriya said the entire management and the staff were shocked over the loss of life, injuries caused to innocent churchgoers and the properties destroyed.

However, these terrorist acts affected the EC in a different way because it disrupted the celebration of important world events like marking ‘World Press Freedom Day’ on April 3, ‘International Day of Families’, ‘International Day of Biodiversity’, ‘Safety and Health at Work’ on April 28 and ‘Mother Day’ on May 22," he said. (Sandun A Jayasekera)