Colombo, 22 Sept 

Marxist leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake, 56, on Sunday was declared winner of the Sri Lankan presidential election by the country's Election Commission after an unprecedented second round of counting of votes.

The election on Saturday was the first to be held since mass protests unseated Gotabaya Rajapaksa in 2022 after the country suffered an economic crisis.

His accession to the post is a remarkable turnaround for his half-century-old party Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), which had long remained on the margins.

The leader of the JVP's broader front, the National People’s Power (NPP), Dissanayake's anti-corruption message and his promise of a change in political culture resonated strongly with young voters who have been demanding system change since the economic crisis.

The NPP's popularity has risen sharply since 2022 after securing only around three per cent of the vote in the last presidential election in 2019.

Dissanayake, during another event in March, passionately asserted that the political struggle is not merely about a change of government but an endeavour to usher in political, economic, and social transformations of paramount importance in Sri Lanka’s history.

Dissanayake, is a science graduate from the Colombo suburban Kelaniya University.

He joined the JVP, the mother party of the NPP, in 1987 at the height of their anti-Indian rebellion.

In the 2000 parliamentary election, he entered Parliament from the JVP. He has been an opposition livewire since 2001.

Having won again from Colombo in 2015, he became the chief opposition whip, a post he held till 2019.

Dissanayake faces the immediate challenge of determining the future of economic reforms in the cash-strapped country. -PTI