Residents of Agoda Premier Village suffer due to UDA action
View(s):Residents of the Agoda Premier Village at Peliyagoda have to suffer due to many misgivings as a result of the short-sighted action by the Urban Development Authority (UDA).This premier housing scheme was initiated by the then Minister of Housing, the late President Ranasingha Pemadasa, with the assistance of a British group headed by the late Richard Aluvirare and a leading architect of that era David Hughes.
The idea was to put up a premium housing scheme with all modern conveniences and house the upper middle class in the scheme.
However, some politicians of the area and the local authority personnel made it a point to block the project and housing structures have been removed and sold by them.
In the meantime there was a period where part of the land was occupied by illegal occupants and the UDA was able to partly remove them from the land.It has been revealed that this land had been handed over to the Sri Lanka Ports Authority by the UDA. Based on this the port officials used this land as a dumping yard for the soil removed from the port expansion which had resulted in blocking all the waterways and streams.
On the other side of the land, the Katunayake-Colombo highway was built without giving any consideration to the environmental impact and it had further taken an area that was otherwise used for rain water retention.
The residents have written to everyone possible and also met the UDA Chairman in person but no solution had been offered by the past Chairman despite his undertaking to sort out all basic issues. The UDA runs a lorry park on one side of the land but without any proper facilities and the access road to the scheme is completely destroyed due to the containers plying on the access road. We request the new UDA administration at least to look into our issues and offer solutions.The Ports Authority and the Housing Minister should look at these grievances and offer solutions under the “Yahapalanaya” regime.
Residents of Agoda Premier Village