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Housing
hits brick wall Despite donors, including local and foreign non governmental organisations and local companies coming forward to construct houses for the displaced, finding alternate land to construct houses has hit a brick wall. The Sunday Times spoke to several Government Agents of different districts who said that finding land to build houses has been a major hurdle, thereby delaying the resettlement of displaced people. In some areas though the sites have been identified, many of the victims are reluctant to move into these areas as they are located far away from their original homes. The government's decision to impose a buffer zone in the reconstruction of damaged houses has aggravated the problem of finding alternate land, the GAs said. Throughout the island 300,000 people still live in welfare centres or with their friends and relatives. Colombo District GA, G.A.J. Sylvester speaking to The Sunday Times said, "We were trying to acquire some land belonging to the Railways Department in the Ratmalana area, but they were not willing to give the land as they had their own expansion projects. Thereafter I was advised to look for other places where temporary shelters could be put up," he said. He said accordingly, some land in Padukka, Meepe and Homagama were identified, but here, residents protested saying they did not want displaced people being resettled in the vicinity. He said the 100 metre buffer zone was another hurdle with people not willing to live in alternate plots of land in the outskirts, as their livelihoods were centred around the areas they earlier lived in. Nine schools were still being occupied by displaced people in the Colombo district, Mr. Sylvester said. In Matara, officials were facing similar problems and they were finding it difficult to find suitable land. Matara GA, H.G.S. Jayasekara said in addition to finding land for houses, providing land for affected business establishments was a problem. "Though we have identified some alternate land the people are reluctant to move into these areas as they are far away from their orginal homes," he said. Currently 3,325 people are living in welfare centres and camps in the district while thousands of others are living with friends and relatives. Hambantota GA, M.A.Piyasena said that 11,662 people were still living in tents and temporary shelters. He said though they have identified land they were awaiting the allocation of funds for the construction of houses in some areas. He said 50 houses completed by NGOs will be ready for occupation by April 6. In Galle, the land problem has been aggravated with some affected people even encroaching on unauthorised land and the government doing little to solve the mounting problem. Galle GA G. Hewavitharan confirmed that there were several cases of people illegally setting up temporary shelters in private and state lands. He said this problem will aggravate if the resettlement programme does not get underway soon. However, he said the progress in constructing houses in the district was satisfactory with 814 houses being constructed by NGOs so far, from the 2,228 they had promised to build. A total of 5,489 houses are required in the Galle district to resettle displaced persons. In the Kalutara district, 34,671 persons were still living in welfare centres. The GA for the district, Ravi Dissanayake said although land was available, getting the people to move to those areas was difficult. In Ampara, over 100,000 persons were still living in welfare centres and so far the construction of houses has not commenced, according to the Additional Government Agent, Asanka Jayawardena. He said one of the problems they were facing was that as the communities were used to living in their own areas, they were now not prepared to live in an area common to all communities. He said although they had been able to identify lands, they were situated interior and the people wanted to remain close to the coastal areas. In Batticaloa district 20,888 people were still living in welfare centres that included five schools. Here too it was the same problem with many of the displaced unwilling to settle down in the alternate plots of land as they were far away from their original homes, according to the GA, V.Shanmugam He also said that reconstruction and rehablilitation work had been hindered as they lacked staff and equipment. He said, so far no construction work had been undertaken by the state, though some 12,000 homes had been destroyed in the district. In Trincomalee 126,679 people had been affected and most of them were living in the 19 welfare centres. According to the GA, M.D.A.G. Rodrigo one of the main problems was keeping to the requirement of the buffer zone when finding suitable land for the resettlement process. Obtaining the release of the land ear-marked for resettlement has also been a problem. The GA said some houses had been constructed to mark the three months following the tsunami devastation and they were to be handed over yesterday. In Jaffna 26,767 persons were still displaced and they were living in the 11 welfare centres. Here too, the GA, K.Ganesh lamented that one of the major hurdles was finding land in keeping with the 100 metre restriction. He said they had appealed to the government to relax the buffer zone to enable the people to resettle in their original places. "For instance if I stick to the buffer zone restriction, in Vadamarachchi I would have to relocate nearly two thirds of the population there. This is not practical as many of them are fishermen. The people say they are willing to take the risk and go back to where they lived before the tsunami. In the LTTE controlled Mullativu district some 22,557 persons are being looked after in 21 welfare centres, Government Agent for the district, Emelda Sukumar said one of the main problems they were facing was that there was not enough state land to resettle the people as the town, which was badly hit had to be relocated too. "Since we have to move the town as well and go beyond the 200 metre buffer zone we need a large extent of land. We do not have sufficient land. We have identified a 500 acre private property owned by the Bishop's house of Jaffna and we are presently negotiating the deal," she said. Ms. Sukumar said that the Rs. 250,000 allocated for each family to construct houses was not sufficient and they had appealed to the government to allocate Rs. 550,000 each as strong constructions need to be put up due to the vulnerability of the area. She said although an area to settle about 1,200 families had been identified, they were still awaiting permission from the National Land Commission. |
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