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SRI LANKA: ‘Rice Paddies More Valuable Than Int’l Airport’

Feizal Samath

HAMBANTOTA, Oct 8 2008 (IPS) - Sri Lankan rice farmers who fought against President Mahinda Rajapakse and his powerful brothers, trying to construct an international airport on their paddies, say they won because their cause was just and enjoyed popular support.

Farmer leader Premachandra who stopped the ruling Rajapakses from building an international airport on precious paddies. Credit: J. Weerasekera/IPS

Farmer leader Premachandra who stopped the ruling Rajapakses from building an international airport on precious paddies. Credit: J. Weerasekera/IPS

“There was no hidden agenda. It was not a personal battle; I fought in the national interest and 800 families were involved in the campaign. Why did the Rajapakses back off? Maybe because we were clean and honest,” says H.M. Premachandra, 52, president of the local paddy farmers’ society that so successfully campaigned against the airport.

Seated inside his small brick house in this southern coastal town – ancestral home of the President and where development activity has sprung up all over – Premachandra says he and his colleagues have no objection to an airport in the area since that will help develop the region and provide jobs.

“Our objection was that there are better places in Hambantota for this project. This is fertile land, supports many farming families and is bounded on three sides by protected areas [Buttala bird sanctuary],” Premachandra told IPS.

Launched in 2006, the government called off the project this July in the face of stiff protest by farmers and environmentalists.

It was only the second time that a group of residents and stakeholders had objected to a development project and actually succeeded in Sri Lanka – which has mostly been run by powerful political families.


Some years ago, residents from the north-central town of Eppawela, a graphite-rich area, campaigned against government plans to hand over a site in the town to a United States-based firm. The government backed off after protestors accused the government of selling away national resources to foreigners.

Hambantota, once a sleepy town and considered among the most impoverished districts in Sri Lanka, woke up to a major development phase after Rajapakse won power in end 2005. Apart from the international airport, the second after Colombo, construction is already on to build a harbour-cum-port.

Roads in the district have been widened and smoothly paved. A mega complex housing government buildings and an international conference hall – the country’s biggest – is under construction. An oil refinery is coming up.

The development of Hambantota is being personally supervised by President Rajapakse and his brothers, Chamal (minister of ports and shipping) and Basil (advisor to the president). A third brother, Gotabaya, is defence secretary, a powerful job in a country engaged in a long-running civil war.

While many of Rajapakse’s critics see Hambantota’s development as a means to boost his personal power, no one denies that the district has always been considered a suitable location for a harbour and port since it sits on a crucial shipping lane and some 300 ships sail by daily. Access to Hambantota is easier than to the existing major ports of Colombo and Trincomalee.

The rationale for a second international airport is that Colombo is getting congested, and is poorly connected to the hinterland. Officially, Hambantota has been picked because of its location, availability of space and also proximity to key tourist resorts in the south and the tea-growing, hill country.

Veteran environmentalist and lawyer Jagath Gunawardene, who backed the farmers’ protest and fought the case in courts on their behalf, says Premachandra deserves credit for the abandonment of the airport project.

However, he believes that due credit should also be given to the president for seeing the light and changing the location. “While Premachandra had the guts to take on Rajapakse on his own turf, credit must be given to the president for not proceeding with a pet project – we all know that politicians generally bulldoze their way through at whatever cost,” he added.

Farmers and environmentalists protested against the campaign on the grounds that it would affect the livelihoods of hundreds of farmers and their families and disrupt a bird sanctuary which is host to millions of migratory birds every year.

Rejecting claims by some groups that aircraft and birds have been comfortable together in other countries, Gunawardene points to the Tel Aviv airport, which is close to a bird sanctuary and where hundreds of birds suddenly converged on the runway in 2006 forcing the airport to close for two days. The birds disrupted operations against the Hezbollah at the time and denied air cover to Israeli ground forces.

Premachandra’s small dining table brims over with files and paper cuttings of the campaign. Showing the land location and maps which are neatly filed, he says Rajapakse at a meeting in the town in March 2006 had announced that a airport was coming up in Buttala on a land area of 1,125 hectares. “We objected as there were 2,500 families in seven villages on this site which was good farm land,” he said.

He said outsiders (farmers from other unaffected villages) were present at the meeting in which 1,500 people took part, but there were only about 70 farmers from the affected area. “When the president threatened to take it out of the district, the outsiders objected and said the location was okay.”

Two weeks later the protests began at the fields with the involvement of 300-400 farmers. A court action was filed and supported by Gunawardene on the grounds that an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA), a lawful requirement, had not been obtained for the project. However the court held that the action was premature as work had not begun and asked the petitioners to come back with their objections once work starts.

A foundation stone was laid by President Rajapakase with a lot of fanfare but work could not start because of mounting protests. There were charges that the campaign was instigated by the Marxist People’s Liberation Front (or JVP) since Premachandra was an active member of the group. “I may be with the JVP but I have also been a member of other political parties in the past. This had nothing to do with politics. Our farmers supported all political parties. We were fighting for our rights and a common cause,” he said laughing.

Premachandra said a lot of stories were being spread about his involvement. There were veiled threats to his family on the one hand and assurances of jobs for him and four of his five sons on the other if he quit the campaign. His eldest son is a Buddhist monk.

“There is no doubt that Premachandra has guts and courage. It was the JVP that was instrumental in bringing President Rajapakse into power and it would have been difficult for Premachandra to fight against a politician who he had helped to bring to power. Nevertheless, he stood by his principles,” Gunawardene said.

Although the JVP had helped Rajapakse win the presidential election, it subsequently pulled out of the coalition and is now very critical of the president and his government, accusing it of corruption and mismanagement. Rajapakse won the 2005 poll in a close contest, securing 50.29 percent of the vote against the 48.43 percent polled by close contender, Ranil Wickremasinghe, who is now opposition leader.

Premachandra recalled how government officials had even threatened to cut water supply to the rice fields, which led to farmers sitting down in protest in the main government office in Hambantota. “There were many protests,” he said.

‘’Can you value paddy land through rupees and cents in a country where the economy is driven by rice production and consumption? If we lose these lands, we lose our food security and then have to import rice,” is his irrefutable argument.

 
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