At stake in this election:      

• 225 seats in the Parliament

Description of government structure:

• Chief of State: President Maithripala SIRISENA*
• Head of Government: President Maithripala SIRISENA
• Assembly: Sri Lanka has a unicameral Parliament with 225 seats. 

* Under the contingent vote system, voters may rank up to three candidates. If no candidate wins a majority in the first round of counting, ballots whose first rankings are eliminated candidates are redistributed to the next-ranked candidates on those ballots. The winner is the candidate with the most votes after this second round of counting.

Description of electoral system:

• The President is elected through a contingent vote system to serve a 6-year term.
• In the Parliament 225 members are elected by open list proportional representation in multi-member constituencies to serve 6-year terms.***

*** Parties must clear a threshold of one-eighth of votes to win seats in the respective constituency. Each voter may cast three preference votes. There are 22 multi-member constituencies containing 196 seats and one nationwide constituency with 29 seats.

Election Note:

• The election was originally scheduled for 2 years from now but was rescheduled by President Maithripala Sirisena following his victory in the January 2015 presidential race.[1] 

Main parties in the electoral race[2]:

• Party: United People's Freedom Alliance
  • Leader: Maithripala SIRISENA
  • Seats won in last election: 144
• Party: United National Party
  • Leader: Ranil WICKRAMASINGHE
  • Seats won in last election: 60
• Party: Tamil National Alliance (Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kadchi)
  • Leader: Mavai SENATHIRAJAH
  • Seats won in last election: 14
• Party: Democratic National Alliance (Janathā Vimukthi Peramuṇa)
  • Leader: Sarath FONSEKA
  • Seats won in last election: 7

Last election:

• The last election for the Parliament was held on 8 April 2010.  There were 14,088,500 registered voters for the election.  The United People's Freedom Alliance won 144 seats (of 225) or 60.66% of the vote, the United National Party won 60 seats, the Tamil National Alliance won 14 seats, and the Democratic National Alliance won 7 seats.  Results can be found here. 

Population and number of registered voters:

• Population: 21,866,445 (July 2014 est.)
• Registered Voters:15,044,499[3]

Gender Data:

• Female Population: 11,172,825
• Is Sri Lanka a signatory to CEDAW: Yes (17 July 1980)
• Has Sri Lanka ratified CEDAW: Yes (5 October 1981)
• Gender Quota:  No
• Female Candidates in this election: Yes
• Number of Female Legislators: 13 (6%) of 225 seats in Parliament 
• Human Development Index (HDI) Position: 73 (2014)
• Social Institutions and Gender Index (SIGI) Categorization: Medium (2014)

Disability Data:

• Is Sri Lanka a signatory to CRPD: Yes (30 March 2007)
• Has Sri Lanka ratified CRPD: No