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Army pull-out affects poor in midlife crisis
View(s):A project to uplift the living standards of villagers in the Eastern and Northern Province has run into problems regarding repayment, due to lack of supervision.
Under the project, the Regional Development Bank (RDB) provided loans to villagers to engage in small and medium enterprises such as brick making, maintenance of retail shops, to purchase water pumps, cement block making, agricultural activities and other self-employment opportunities, said RDB Chief Manager (Credit) Ananda Thotadeniya.
He said the loans were provided.
He said field officers were deployed, and in the Trincomalee district alone some 4,000 loans were provided to persons of low income groups to improve their living standards.
He said the Army too was stationed in some areas and assisted in finding beneficiaries, while village leaders were appointed to further strengthen the scheme.
However, subsequently it was revealed that due to lack of supervision the funds had been misused and some had defaulted on their repayments. Some of them had actually incurred losses while others defaulted in repaying though they were successful.
The Sunday Times learns that after the Presidential elections last year, the Army’s supervision over the project had been withdrawn, further affecting the project.
Ahungala Seela Vishudhi Thera from Uppuveli told the Sunday Times that the scheme was beneficial to the poor people in the area, and some of them had raised their living standards.
He declined to comment on the current status of the project, but said projects of this nature will be helpful to the community in these areas.
Some of the villagers were those directly affected by the war.