The Hon. Aruna Panagoda
Aruna Panagoda raised concerns over a fence erected by the National Water Supply and Drainage Board around a lagoon, stating that it was decided without requests from residents or public representatives and obstructs a road used for decades. He questioned the justification based on safety risks, including a reported suicide, and asked the Minister to intervene and review the decision to protect public access. He also noted alleged damage to embankments and water leakage into fields, suggesting that official reports on the site’s condition may be inaccurate.
Verbatim record (translated)
Machine-translated from Sinhala / Tamil / English¶ 01 Hon. Minister, this fence was not requested by residents or public representatives. The NWSDB decided it unilaterally, citing risk of someone falling in. By that logic, should we fence entire reservoirs? For 40 years this lagoon existed without a fence. A suicide there does not justify closing a long-used road; those intent on self-harm could bypass a fence. Officials seem intent on fencing rather than safeguarding public access. Please intervene and review this, and also note that the embankments have overturned and leakage seeps into fields; the reported condition may not be accurate.
Provenance
- Source
- Hansard, Friday, 21 February 2025 ·No. 1740809173064396 ·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/3638
Cite as: The Hon. Aruna Panagoda. 10th Parliament, Parliament of Sri Lanka. Hansard, 21 February 2025. No. 1740809173064396. Politick, https://staging.politick.io/lk/speeches/3638