Sri Lanka has gone through a turbulent period for fifty years, with civil wars, racist pogroms, insurrections, vicious government crackdowns involving death squads, and the undermining of civil liberties and democratic institutions like the police and judiciary. Just two years ago, the government was on the verge of bankruptcy that led to massive protests that resulted in the then president and his brother the prime minister forced to abandon their posts and homes and flee the country.

There was hope that this would signal a new era in politics where the corrupt old guard would be swept away to be replaced by a new generation of leadership. But that did not happen. What did happen was that an old politician Ranil Wickremesinghe, a nepo baby himself from an old guard ruling family, who had led his party that once dominated Sri Lankan politics into deep decline so that they were completely eliminated from parliament except for one seat to which he appointed himself, managed to become president through a parliamentary maneuver believed to have been engineered by the ousted and disgraced leaders. He had himself run for the post of president before and been roundly defeated and he was seen as having no mandate. It was felt that he had been installed in the position by the former disgraced leaders in order to protect them from the consequences of the rampant corruption and violations of human right of which they had been accused. Since Wickremesinghe was seen as pro-western, he was viewed favorably by the US and the international lending agencies like the IMF and World Bank.

But in yesterday’s election in which 38 (!) people contested the presidency, Wickremesinghe was trounced yet again, coming in third with just 17% of the vote. The winner was 55-year old Anura Kumara Dissanayake with 42% in the first round of counting and got 55% when the second and third preferences of those who came third or worse were counted. He represents a remarkable story. He is the leader of a coalition led by his own party the JVP that attempted two insurrections in the 1970s and 1980s that were brutally suppressed, with many of its leaders killed or sent to prison. The ideology of the party has been all over the place at various times, having in the past used Marxist rhetoric while at the same time also being chauvinist in support of the majority Sinhala ethnic community and supporting the previous governments’ brutal repression of the Tamil and Muslim minorities. While the party’s views seems to have moderated over the years, there is still some apprehension among members of the Tamil, Muslim, and other minorities about what his stance will be towards them.

In his victory statement, he seemed to recognize the importance of this issue.

Following his victory, Dissanayake called for national unity and said, “The unity of Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims, and all Sri Lankans is the bedrock of a new beginning.” He further stressed that the “new renaissance we seek will rise from this shared strength and vision,” expressing hope for “a fresh start: to realise the country’s vision.

He inherits massive economic problems created by decades of mismanagement and corruption that has resulted in crippling debt obligations due to borrowing and profligate spending. But at least he comes with a mandate to govern and is free of the taint of past corruption. It remains to be seen if he can build on that sense of hope or whether he too will squander it away by enriching himself and his cronies like the previous governments.

What is remarkable is that even though Sri Lanka has, over the last half-century, seen a steady erosion of civil rights and the undermining of democratic institutions, it has managed to avoid the ultimate step of a military takeover and dictatorship and still have credible elections leading to peaceful transfers of power.