Additional Rs. 10,641 m for highways development sought

Uditha Kumarasinghe and Irangika Range

The Government has presented a paper seeking Parliamentary approval for a supplementary estimate for an additional sum of Rs. 10,641 million for the development of highways, expressways and constructing bridges and flyovers.

The supplementary estimate presented to the House by Highways and Road Development Minister T.B. Ekanayake said Rs. 77 billion allocated by the annual budgetary estimate 2009 was not sufficient to complete the road projects this year.

According to the explanation of the proposal, a considerable amount of additional allocation is required due to restructuring some of the road projects funded by foreign aid and foreign related domestic funds.

Additional allocation is also required to settle the bills for the rehabilitation of roads which were damaged due to heavy rains in the recent past.

In addition to this, the Ministry has to facilitate for the accessibility and mobility requirements necessary for the implementation of the programs such as Negenahira Navodaya and Uthuru Wasanthaya which are being implemented to develop the areas liberated from the terrorists and for the construction of access roads Ranaviru village in Ipalagoama.

These works were not anticipated at the preparation of annual estimates for the year 2009.

The sum had been sought to Expressways Development (Rs. 408 million), Highways Development (Rs. 819 million), Widening and Improvement of Roads (Rs. 1,610 million), construction of bridges and flyovers (5,584 million), Tsunami Affected Road Rehabilitation (Rs. 2005 million) and institutional support (Rs. 215 million).

"When considering the actual expenditure incurred within the last seven months of this year and the number of bills to be settled for completed works, the allocation made available for year 2009 is highly inadequate. It is observed that the balance allocation will exhaust shortly.

Every possible action has already been taken to manage the additional funding requirement for some votes within the amount provided in the Budget Estimate 2009 for this Ministry.

However, it is observed that without an additional provision, foreign funded projects could not be implemented," the explanation of the proposal said.