President Mahinda Rajapksa is expected to ceremonially let water into the 17 metre-deep harbour basin of Hambantota today. Yang Xiuping, Chinese Ambassador to Sri Lanka and the Maldives has been invited by Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) to witness the event. Two of China’s state-owned companies - China Harbour Engineering Company and the Sinohydro Corporation – have been constructing the deep-sea port, 260 kilometres south of Colombo, since 2008.
Beginning today, the harbour basin will be filled with water, one meter a day. It could take up to three weeks for the entire 17 metre depth to be filled. In November, the first ship would be docked in the harbour in another ceremony likely to be again presided over by President Rajapaksa whose electoral home constituency is Hambantota. With that, the first phase of the port project costing $360 million would be completed.
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| Hive of activity: Hambantota harbour site. Pix by Saman Kariyawasam and Kishan Jeevaka Jayaruk |
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China’s Exim Bank provided for 85 per cent of the cost under a loan scheme while the remaining was borne by the Sri Lankan government. According to officials of the SLPA, the second phase of the project estimated to cost $600 million would take off by the year-end and is scheduled for completion by late 2013. Of the four terminals at Hambantota Port, two would handle cargo ships while two others would offer services to ships such as fuelling facilities, repair works and space for waiting in the waters.
Geographically placed between the Strait of Malacca and the Suez Canal – a sea route used by over 50,000 ships a year, the Hambantota Port could well drive commercial activities for Sri Lanka. The location might have been a key consideration for the SLPA while doing its feasibility studies on the project. “The east-west sea lane has close to 70,000 ships going through it annually. Even if we can offer cargo handling and services to a few thousand ships, it will be very good for us,” Agil Hewageegana, chief engineer, Hambantota Port, told the Sunday Times last Thursday.
According to legend, Chinese and Arabian traders may have used Hambantota as a harbour facility in ancient times as part of the silk route trade channel. Mr Hewageegana, said, they would now again look at the Arab world for major business. With 80,000 cubic metres of storage space in 14 tanks alongside the harbour, the SLPA would supply oil and water in addition to providing off-shore bunkering to visiting ships.
China for instance used the Strait of Malacca to tranship its oil imports from countries such as Sudan through tankers. Connecting Hambantota to the east-west sea corridor would therefore help China’s commercial interests, diplomatic sources in Colombo said. While both Chinese and Sri Lankan governments maintained that the Hambantota Port project was for commercial purposes, the Indian government was concerned that Chinese strategic interests were increasing in the Indian Ocean region, the sources added.
With its Line of Credit to Sri Lanka estimated at around $3.4 billion, China also emerged as Sri Lanka’s biggest single lender in 2009 (in commitments), overtaking lending agencies such as the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB). In the process China has also overtaken Japan as this country’s traditional top lender.
China’s 300 megawatt coal power project in Norochcholai in Puttlam costing $455 million for the first stage was also likely to be commissioned this year. According to officials of Sri Lanka’s Board of Investment (BoI), Colombo and Beijing had signed agreements enabling the second and third phases of the project to begin in October. China’s Exim Bank provided $891 million for the second and third phases which when complete would enable the power plant generate more than 600 megawatts.
Even as the first phase of the Hambantota Port project inched closer to the finish-line, the SLPA decided that the 300 Chinese construction workers would continue to build the port in the next stage as well along with 18 SLPA engineers and Sri Lankan construction workers assisting project works. Aerial views of the project office pictures at Hambantota Port show the buildings shaped in the word formations: China SLK. A 14-storeyed building housing SLPA officials and engineers was also expected to come up at the project site.
To further develop the area almost in line with export promotion zones, the SLPA would evaluate bids by potential investors on August 17. Almost half of the dredging activity along 1.5 kilometres of the Kataragama-Matara road would soon be completed. However, the deconstruction of this road stretch had irked the local population earlier as a new pathway had to be found for traffic and people’s movements. A section of the local population was also unsure about jobs in the project since the majority of the construction workers were Chinese.
Small businesses too were skeptical as was indicated in a report of the Hambantota District Chamber of Commerce. “It is entirely plausible that the vast majority of inward port investors will come from abroad or Colombo, and not the district,” an in-house journal of the organisation had noted last year. |
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