COLOMBO: Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse vowed today to ensure the first post-war nationwide election goes off peacefully, as he prepared to face his former army chief after an acrimonious campaign.

Rajapakse urged the authorities to ensure a free and fair vote in Tuesday’s presidential contest amid claims from the opposition that he plans to rig the result and is preparing a coup in the event that he is defeated. “The Sri Lanka government calls for a peaceful election and stands committed to taking whatever steps deemed necessary,” his office said in a statement. Rajapakse, who ordered the military offensive that ended a 37-year conflict against Tamil rebels in May last year, faces a strong challenge from Sarath Fonseka, the army chief who led the troops in battle.

A total of 68,000 police and 250,000 public

officials will be on duty to monitor the election, which is seen as too close to call. There are no reliable opinion polls in the Indian Ocean island nation.

In the run-up to the vote, the opposition and government have made claim and counter-claim about each other’s intentions, raising the prospect of instability and a contested result.

Warning of street protests and resistance to any attempt by Rajapakse to steal the election, Fonseka declared Monday: “If there is a war, we will face it.” At least five people have been killed and hundreds wounded during campaigning, according to the private Centre for Monitoring Election Violence (CMEV).

The two candidates,

both Sinhalese nationalists, fell out after the war, with Fonseka retiring from the military after he was sidelined by Rajapakse and launching his surprise bid for the presidency.

Rajapakse called the vote after only four years of

his six-year mandate to try to harness public acclaim for victory over the Tamil Tiger rebels, who controlled one-third of Sri Lanka just 10 years ago.

Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama played down the prospects of street protests after the election, predicting the government would win a new mandate fairly and the opposition would soon forget its campaign rhetoric.

Bogollagama also claimed foreign interests were interfering, but declined to identify them until after the election. A ruling party lawmaker has already pointed the finger at the United States and former peacebroker Norway.

The CMEV, a private group that is accredited as an election monitoring body, said in a report it had found serious flaws

in the electoral process in the run-up to the race, which has 22 candidates standing in total.

“With deep regret we have to say that we have a picture of a dysfunctional electoral process and the breakdown of the authority of the (independent) elections commission,” CMEV director Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu said.