Colombo – beautification or wanton destruction?

Congratulations to the Editorial staff of The Island, who keep bringing up “unpalatable facts” to make the “Authorities”, somewhat uneasy.

Several recent editorials have not minced words, and reportedly at higher levels, there has been “Movement at the Station”, to coin an Australian phrase describing agitation and unease!

This ‘better than the rest” reputation extends to the many ‘Letters to the Editor” such as the letter by Deshamanya Ashley De Vos on 4th October. In an uncompromising letter he deals with the “beautification of Colombo City”. It’s absolutely correct that cities like Singapore which we mindlessly adulate, are places where people have been carefully “cloned to live and work in an artificial environment”, where, if the inhabitants ever smile, they certainly don’t seem to do so in the presence of others!

If you don’t believe me, visit Singapore where” the clones do not even smile anymore” as he correctly states. Thankfully, this does not extend to the “land of smiles” Thailand (even if the smiles are partly to relieve the tourist of his bucks). Once upon a time, Ceylonese too, had reasons to wear a smile.

It is sacrilegious to Colombo’s inhabitants, that some idiot should contemplate widening the road by digging up the National Museum’s beautiful lawn. In a pertinent sentence De Vos has said- “other countries with access to cheap Oil, (either their own or robbed), are moving (towards) Mass transport”., “there is no need to endlessly keep widening roads”, or ‘developing’ them! The suggestion to widen the road must have come without the knowledge or approval of the President

As a random example, Elibank Road in Colombo 5 where I used to live, was once a road full of elegant houses with beautiful front lawns and flowering gardens. Today, it’s a fortress of high walls, built right upto the roadside.

JAYMAN