Comments on: Economics of the Colombo Port City Project

By: Kathir Mahen

Kathir Mahen — Tue, 31 Mar 2015 02:59:00 +0000

Unfortunately, there is no public interest litigation in Srilanka. If there is good free judiciary, all the projects which have come up in previous regimes would have been challenged in court of law under public interest litigation. Even the JVP would have filed a case rather than shouting on public platforms.

To protect our country from opportunistics, we need a good free judiciary and media. Further, the people should be educated on Rule of Law, UN Convention on Human Rights etc. Singapore increased the land size by brining the earth from hilly Indoneshia. Our government is changing the topography of the country while the topography is closelly related to the climate changes and stable whether which again closelly related to the main occupation of Srilanka, farming , cultivation and up country economic crops.

Therefore, a healthy platform opened at Judiciary to discussthe above.

By: R S S Perera

R S S Perera — Wed, 25 Mar 2015 19:02:00 +0000

Like most other articles on the Port City this one also misses a very important aspect of this failed project.When a company examines an investment in another country it has to ensure that all the relevant aspects have been looked into and ensure that the investment is able to meet the companies expectations.

It was CCCC’s responsibility to ensure that all the approvals were in place prior to spending any money on the Colombo Port City development. Neither CCCC nor their ultimate owner, the Chinese government, can now claim that it is an obligation of a democratic government to respect an international bilateral agreement reached with another country by the previous government, after CCCC went ahead and commenced work prior to the project being approved by parliament, as required by the local law.

CCCC should not have accepted the ex-president’s word that all approvals would be provided in due course, not even, or in fact particularly, because they paid substantial kick-backs to various fixers associated with the ex-president.

Like Packer of Australia, they should just walk away, and unlike Packer they will have to take a loss because they commenced work before they had all the approvals in hand.

By: Ram

Ram — Tue, 03 Mar 2015 08:03:00 +0000

Such a detailed analysis with the basic cost of construction wrong. It is USD 1.5 billion NOT USD 15.0 billion.
Appalled. Author should have taken a basic finance class or in common sense first before questioning a viability of such a project which obviously would have global consultants team on board.

By: Rohan Wickramasinghe

Rohan Wickramasinghe — Wed, 25 Feb 2015 05:24:00 +0000

Pl see The Island 23rd and 24th Feb.

http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=120105
http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=120156
If the writer is an economist why does he write $15 billion?

By: Ranil Jayantha Wijeyesekera

Ranil Jayantha Wijeyesekera — Sat, 21 Feb 2015 03:53:00 +0000

Land is relatively cheap. Countries will invest in a Industrial city in Trincomalee. This will generate jobs.

By: Malith Mendis

Malith Mendis — Wed, 11 Feb 2015 08:08:00 +0000

I am the former CEO of LHI. I understand that an Environment study was done. But whether this study is for this final scope of the project needs checking. It is well understood that sediment will collect on the Southern side of the Colombo South Harbour Breakwater, and it was logical that a triangular piece of land could be filled and sold at a premium. I see that the Beira Lake outlet is to the South West, this is sure to cause sedimentation and consequent stagnation, especially during the South West Monsoon. The outlet should be to the West or North West to ensure that the discharge will disperse. Otherwise, we are in for a big stink!

By: Curious

Curious — Mon, 09 Feb 2015 22:04:00 +0000

Sri Lanka is a small country and access to any part of it can be made quite rapid. There is also plenty of undeveloped land in the country. Why build this in the sea – creating large uncertainties on the environmental impact front? Building on existing land and creating a rapid transit system to that area would be very much less costly and less risky.

By: Ananda

Ananda — Mon, 09 Feb 2015 13:31:00 +0000

This writer uses 10 times of actual cost….how anybody can depend on his analysis is reader’s responsibility!

By: Sharanga Ratnayake

Sharanga Ratnayake — Mon, 09 Feb 2015 09:58:00 +0000

This $15 billion is an insane amount of money, that we’d be able to develop Colombo just by looking at it. Unfortunately this isn’t correct. Below is from Sri Lanka Port Authority website.

“The investment for the basic infrastructure for the Colombo port city was US$ 1.4 billion and the total investment for it will surpass US$ 2 billion, while for the Hambantota port city will comprise 108 acres and the total investment will be US$ 50 million.”
http://www.slpa.lk/port_city.asp?chk=4

Anyway, I wouldn’t go about complaining about the government’s decision to continue with the project. What’s the point? The simple matter of the fact is we can’t say no to the Chinese at this point. Our economy runs on their loans, and our entire foreign policy, and our strategy against international war crime probes is centred around them. So we do whatever they say.