The Hon. Sajith Premadasa - Leader of the Opposition
Sajith Premadasa questioned how the Government can effectively protect reserves, forests and buffer zones, including Sinharaja and the Hakwatunawa Tank Reserve, if officials enforcing conservation laws are transferred or obstructed. He cited the transfer of Wildlife officer Chathura Gunaratne in Herathgama and alleged obstruction of Forest Department officers in Galgamuwa and Kumbukwewa who opposed illegal soil excavation.
Verbatim record (translated)
Machine-translated from Sinhala / Tamil / English¶ 01 Hon. Minister, throughout your answer you clearly outlined the actions to protect the reserve, the forest and the buffer. Indeed, you would accept that protecting reserves, buffers and forests across the country, including Sinharaja, must be implemented. I wish to ask this: when protecting the Hakwatunawa Tank Reserve, the officer-in-charge at the Department of Wildlife office in Herathgama, Mr. Chathura Gunaratne, has been transferred. Likewise, in Galgamuwa and Kumbukwewa, when officers objected to illegal soil excavation on Forest Department lands, they were obstructed. How will you implement a policy of protecting reserves when officers are impeded or transferred for carrying out protection duties?
Provenance
- Source
- Hansard, Tuesday, 6 January 2026 ·No. 23111 ·English daily/uncorrected Hansard
- Page · column
- not yet extracted — page/column anchors are not in the current dataset; the source PDF is the citable location.
- Permalink
/lk/speeches/17528
Cite as: The Hon. Sajith Premadasa - Leader of the Opposition. 10th Parliament, Parliament of Sri Lanka. Hansard, 6 January 2026. No. 23111. Politick, https://staging.politick.io/lk/speeches/17528