President's party wins Lankan local polls

Kumaratunga's Marxist-backed United Freedom Alliance won comfortably in all but one district that went to the polls Saturday, election officials said as final results were tallied.

They said only about half of the 9.6 million electorate had turned out to vote, making it one of the lowest polling elections in recent years.

Kumaratunga herself stayed away from voting because she was "indisposed", a spokesman for her office said.

The ballot was the second local election since the April 2 parliamentary vote, which was called four years ahead of schedule to settle a power struggle between Kumaratunga and her rival, then-prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.