Who guards the guards?

Saturday 5th December, 2020

No sooner had State Minister of Wildlife Protection and Forest Resource Development Wimalaweera Dissanayake barked at a group of Wildlife Officers, ordering that villagers be allowed to graze their cattle inside a wildlife reserve in Polonnaruwa than some Forest Officers felled trees on an ait, known as Parapankotuwa, in Andawala, Matugama. Environmentalists were shown on Hiru News, yesterday, protesting against the destruction of trees near the Benthara Ganga, and one of the Forest Officers present at the scene claimed that they were clearing one acre of land which did not have mangroves for a tree planting campaign, of all things! This being the fate of trees in areas under the Forest Department, it is not difficult to imagine how disastrous the situation will be when the controversial gazette notification removing the residual forests from the purview of the Forest Department and placing them under the District and Divisional Secretariats, takes effect.

Some high-ups of the Wildlife and Land Ministries peddled a ludicrous argument on Derana TV, on Thursday night, in a bid to justify the gazette notification. They tried to counter their critics’ argument that forest lands are safe when they are under the Forest Department and, therefore, they must not be brought under the District or Divisional Secretariats, whose officials easily bend to political pressure. Their efforts to defend the indefensible only made us feel sorry for the public service.

Is the destruction of trees by a group of Forest Officers on the Parapankotuwa ait part of a sinister plan to cause an erosion of public trust in the Forest Department and justify the government decision to place the ‘other state forests’ under District and Divisional Secretariats?

There are many places affected by deforestation that need to be forested. It defies comprehension why the Forest Department is clearing forests, especially mangroves, to plant trees there. Some of the trees felled on the Parapankotuwa eyot are more than 60 years old, according to the protesting environmentalists. Even if the Forest Department plants trees there, they will take decades to reach maturity. So, why fell the mature trees that are already there? Worse, the decimation of big trees and mangroves will cause the ait to suffer erosion when the river swells during monsoons, and newly planted trees will be washed away. Is this what the authorities concerned look forward to because someone can grab the barren, treeless eyot in such an eventuality?

Crooks know how to set about encroaching on environmentally sensitive areas. As for the aforesaid Polonnaruwa wildlife sanctuary, what politicians and their cronies are up to is not difficult to guess. Environmentalists insist that there are sand deposits inside the sanctuary, but they cannot be exploited as there is no road leading to them. If cattle are sent into the wildlife reserve for grazing, footpaths will appear with the passage of time, and they can be widened and used to gain access to the sand deposits.

Politicians of the present government have proved that they have no concern for the environment and are ready to destroy forests or other environmental assets for personal gain. Relying on them to ensure the protection of the country’s forest reserves and natural resources is as ill-advised as entrusting a fox with protecting chickens, as a popular saying goes. Who guards the guards?

Let the Forest Department be urged to stop cutting down trees in already green areas purportedly to launch tree planting campaigns and, instead, concentrate on reforesting the Kallaru reserve, which has suffered extensive damage at the hands of MP Rishad Bathiudeen. The Minister of Wildlife and Forest Conservation C. B. Ratnayake and the Forest Department high-ups owe an explanation as regard the clearing of the tree cover on Parapankotuwa ait.