Thousands of fishermen in fresh protest over Port City saying shallow-water fishing jeopardised
Boats on the beach while its owners protest.
Thousands of fishermen, mooring their boats and forfeiting a day’s catch on Saturday (October 1) joined family members as people got onto the street at various points from Poruthotha – Kammalthota to Uswetakaiyawa on the western coastline in a fresh protest over the Colombo Port City, demanding – among other matters – that the agreement with Chinese authorities should be made known to the public. The controversial project, now renamed the Colombo International Financial City (CIFC), has cleared all hurdles and work is due to resume shortly on the Galle Face site. Carrying placards and shouting slogans protestors accused the government of being ‘diabolical liars’, saying the project would severely affect livelihoods and lose jobs. Protesting fishermen told the Business Times (BT) that they would take their protest to the Ministry of Fisheries and the Chinese Embassy and would mobilise the entire fishing community of the country against the project.
‘Port citiya hakulaganeu’, ‘Ape muhuda apita diyavu’ and ‘Thopita Muhuda, apita maha paara’ (Give us our sea back and do away with the Port City. You invade the sea and we are pushed on to the road), were some of the slogans chanted across Poruthota, Kammalpattuwa to Hekiththa, Palliyawatte covering around 50,000 fisher folk. In some places, traffic was blocked with police seen discreetly following these protests. Protestors allege that the project construction would wash away the thin strip of land between the Negombo lagoon and the sea. They recalled how Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, when in opposition, said that not only the Port City would affect the fishermen from Hikkaduwa to Kalpitiya but there would be other environmental issues affecting towns and villages.
They accused the government of lying saying that the sand would be mined from a distance of 30 km from the sea shore when in fact the sea is being dredged from a distance of less than 3 km from the shore, and that the dredging would continue for three years. Even the government has agreed that the fishing in the sea during this period would be disturbed, the protestors pointed out. Malani Nonis, a protesting grandmother from Seththappaduwa, told the BT that the sea was her lifeline for her entire life helping her husband and their two sons in livelihoods. She said she lost one of her sons in the sea and lamented “Our bread-giver is the sea. Tourism has affected the industry to a great extent and the Port City would throw us out altogether”. Anura Bambarawana of Pitipana said that the development strategies of successive governments have turned out to be a big farce.
He said they suspect that the politicians are promoting these projects as they could obtain commissions while the common man gains absolutely nothing apart from losing their livelihoods and sending the cost of living sky-rocketing. Rev Fr. Sarath Iddamalgoda, the main organizer behind this massive protest and a veteran campaigner against violation of the people’s rights, told the BT that fishermen along the coast from Mount Lavinia to Kammampattu in Kochchikade are agitating as they fear the impending disaster which would compel fishermen to stop fishing in the shallow waters which would be affected due to dredging the sea in close proximity to the shore.
He said that the people have a right to know the contents of the new agreement the present government has entered into with Chinese authorities. The government should publicise it forthwith, he pointed out. Rev Fr. Wickrama Fonseka, who is also involved in the protest, said that all the rich and fertile sediments that flow along the Kelani river would disappear and with that all the fish and prawn breeding grounds would vanish as more than 70 per cent of the sand would be scooped and dredged. These fishermen not only make a living but also do a great service by providing fish at the lowest cost to poor people, he pointed out.
Their catch is small fish like Saalayas, Sudayas, Sprats and Karattayas which are sold at prices ranging from Rs. 100 to Rs.150 per kg whereas other fish would be higher than Rs. 800 per kg, he said. The sand mining would create a huge pit in the sea affecting coral reef barriers, rock barriers and fish breeding grounds, some of the protestors lamented. They alleged huge amount of dynamite were being used. ”Where is the justice? When a bucket of sand is taken from the beach, people are punished while millions of cubes of sand are mined without any fuss and with government consent,” one protestor asked.