In Parliament:

Tsunami homes in liberated North

Parliamentary Corrospondents

Chief Government Whip and Urban Development and Sacred Area Development Minister Dinesh Gunawardana told Parliament yesterday that the Government will construct houses for people in the North who lost their houses in the tsunami, once these areas are liberated from the LTTE.

“Though the Government has taken prompt action to provide relief to tsunami affected people in the North, several attempts by it were not successful due to interruption by the LTTE,” he said. He was responding to an oral question by JVP MP Lakshman Nipunaarachchi.

He said according to records, around 126,268 families and about 116,621 houses were lost in this disaster in the North.

“Around 11,811 families who fell victim to the tsunami have not been provided with permanent houses yet,” Gunewardana said. Meanwhile, various organisations and individuals with no direct intervention of the Government have provided 83,751 houses for 26,898 families.