The Horror Of The Port City EIA
Ranil Senanayake
The Port City project is a glaring example of how national resources are abused by politicians and the bureaucrats at the controls by treating it as their chattel. In doing international deals, the public (even those who might be directly affected) is never consulted, only ‘informed’ by the great leaders that, a deal has been done. The Port City project, which is now in the public eye, gives us an opportunity to comment. The EIA is open for public comment at many points; I examined the copy at the library of the Central Environment Authority (CEA), where there is also a book for comments. It will be in the public domain until the second week of January.
The document itself is very poor and lacks any mention of the impact on the Environment of Colombo. It deals with the dredging and filling operations without once mentioning that there is whole city that its operations will impact.
Not acknowledging that the city of Colombo will have to put up with breathing construction dust for twenty or so years, a gift to a generation of citizens with increased lung problems, nor the danger of flooding in Colombo due to the blockage of the Beira lake outfall has been addressed in this so called EIA.
But a real surprise was the fact that the developer has been awarded reclamation material at ‘zero cost’ where, the cost of the sand and even the Royalty that this nation would receive has been waived. No wonder the developer was so keen on expanding and expanding, we were giving him our land for free. To keep the story right we have to realize that it is a Chinese company we are dealing with here, not the Chinese Government. It is interesting to find out the current financial positions of those who dreamt up and approved the gifting of our revenue in such a cavalier manner. Read More