Hawkers and pedestrians

The intervention of President Mahinda Rajapaksa to offer relief to the pavement hawkers who were evicted in a clean up of the Colombo city is a most welcome move. The President has offered to relocate these pavement hawkers at a designated area and also offered them each Rs 2,000 per day for two weeks when the proposed site would be ready. There is no doubt that there are genuine hawkers that occupied these pavements and it is their plight that the President had uppermost in his mind although they cannot claim any compensation as of right. He has at the same time to consider the travails of pedestrians for whom the pavements are really meant.

We say this because on earlier occasions when unauthorised structures were demolished the payment hawkers were back in no time with the blessings of politicians. All the trouble taken by the UDA to evict these encroachers were in vain. The demolished structures were re-erected and it was business as usual. The authorities adopted a policy of live and let live.

This time however one can expect to see strict implementation of the orders and the back of the pavement hawkers where even the Police would be compelled to stand their ground against pressures by politicians, since the orders have come from the very top.

No doubt the much harried pedestrians will heave a huge sigh of relief by this move. It is no secret that although the pavements were by and large used by those to eke out an existence they also provided a refuge to unsavoury elements who among other things make crude remarks at young females. They were also havens for criminals at night. Most of the pavement business was a cover for drug peddlers and it is also no secret that these make-shift structures were inhabited by pimps and prostitutes. The Police turned a blind eye to this seamy side of the pavement life due to the protection afforded to these elements by politicians.

Paradoxically all this vice were taking place in close proximity to a Temple and a Catholic shrine.

Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa should be commended for his no nonsense stand of not heeding to the pleas of politicians on behalf of these criminals and ordering all unauthorized structures be removed. We hope that this is a precursor for rebuilding the Colombo city as a modern city in line with the bustling capitals of Asia.

The clearing of all temporary structures have already rid the Colombo city from an eyesore. It is the wish of most city folk that work will continue in the same vein to build a remodelled Colombo. Part of this process should be measures to deal with the frequent flooding of the Colombo city by replacing its centuries old drainage system that was constructed at a time when the city was inhabited by a few thousands. Ideally all other major cities in the country too should undergo the same transformation as Sri Lanka forges ahead to be the wonder of Asia.

The ordinary and the bizarre

We live in interesting times with the ordinary and the bizarre in a happy mix. With the escalation of issues threatening life on earth politicians and Statesmen have turned stunt men and women.

It was only a week ago that the Uttarakhand Chief Minister and his Cabinet colleagues had a holy dip in the Ganges following a meeting of the Cabinet which decided to set up a Ganga Conservation Board.

The beginning of such bizarre events began with the President of the Maldives who held a Cabinet meeting under water in the Indian Ocean only to remind the world of the threat faced by his country due to global warming. The Maldives is destined to submerge in the not too distant future with the rise of sea level following the melting of the arctic cap and the Himalayan glaciers.

The Nepal Cabinet, not to be outdone by the Maldivian counterpart did exactly the opposite, holding a meeting atop the Himalayas even carrying the sick and elderly Ministers there with oxygen and first aid kits.

The Sri Lankan Cabinet members should not be disheartened. They could still beat their South Asian colleagues by taking a dip in the Beira Lake or the Diyawanna to show their physical fitness. Perhaps they could cleanse themselves by dipping in the Diyawanna if Beira mud turns sticky.