Mountain of sorrows.

Meethotamulla is a tragedy. According to my personal views, both governments should take the responsibility of what had happened at the meethotamulla.

And i do not like to forget the other groups as well; the dukgannarala’s who delivers millions of speeches saying this and that about this and that issues of the society. We do not need talkers actually what we need is doers. I do not know whether such groups took any actions to deliver any reminding speeches to the relevant or why didn’t they take any actions to smoother the issue. Why they wait till an election to arrive at their door steps to present their plans at stages.

I remember listening to dozens of speeches enclose of loads of promises during previous elections with regard to ‘garbage management and disposal.

Garbage is one of the issues some raised as an issue that needed immediate action.

So though the former government has introduced a design to manage garbage, according to what i over heard (according to revelations of MP, Mr. BandulaGunawardena) and it was submitted to the parliament). i guess that they were unable to implement because they lost the election. i guess they should have fasten the procedures and must have taken fast actions to implement that before facing the election. For a government that had the courage to solve massive issues, we cannot say that solving garbage issue was a difficult task. 

And later the current government until the incident happened i do not know why took no action to find an alternative to the issue. I do not know whether they were planning anything within to solve the issue. And according to my awareness the government gave a lot of attention to study what former ministers have done and try imprisoning those filing cases. Therefore they had little time to concentrate on some of the issues such as ‘the garbage issue’. But according to what i read the president has taken some actions against those who left the country after the incident. 

I read that the minister of the relevant ministryhas told that the government is taking the responsibility of the incident happened. Fair. Apologizing after happening something is good it is sad that he couldn’t hurry up the process that he had in his mind. He is a minister with good records, past.

Iassume that the design and the plan introduced by former government is a proper plan weighing the qualities and the standards of other town plans and what they have already implemented. So kindly view and study the plan and try to implement it.  

According to the newspaper article carried in Lanakadeepa (23/04/2017) one of the environmentalists has warned the danger of having such a huge mountain of garbage. And he has spoken of the consequences. I do not know whether that was the first time the environmentalists warned to the governments who governed the country. relevant must read such articles written on such subjects, listen to programmes when ever they get a chance or when ever possible.

Following details were published in the paper, i read yesterday.

Height of the mountain = 48.5 m

The area they use to dump garbage is about 20 acres

They dump 1200 tons of garbage daily at the premises.

According to the sources, number of people died due to the issue exceeds the number 20. i have not noted any thing about the other damages due to the incident because no damage is massive compared to loss of human lives. 

There are things you cannot change or things that are difficult to change.

One of them is that it is hard to change the perceptions of some people. And the other thing is you cannot give life back to a dead.

Although the incident happened cannot be changed or ‘redo’ and the sorrows and hardships is larger, i appreciate that immediate actions they took to relieve, to solve the problem, The Housing solution for example.

The government said that they have warned the people to leave the place. But just saying is not enough. You must follow up and monitor. You cannot solve it alone, forgetting or without listening to people’s voices. You must show them a proper way that won’t fail, so that they can’t say ‘we can’t or they won’t ‘ignore’.

What is next?

Are you planning until the other mountains collapses into the heads and lives of people? Blumendal?Or immediately planning to have a proper mechanism to bin and dispose garbage?

I know that it is not easy because it is not an issue one or two years old. I guess due to increase of population and lack of places, land areas with less population or barren lands binning garbage within town zones is not easy. So solving it is no easy. to solve something easily or accurately one must take actions at the preliminary stage of an issue.

I do not know why was it not possible to recycle the garbage collected by separating them without taking any intervals or letting the tons of garbage turned into mountains.

I remember visiting the place near the cemetery, the place used to dump garbage,Dadella, in Galle about more than a decade ago.i visited that place as a enumerator to get people’s perceptions on the place that then government or the relevant authority used to dump garbage.  After one or two visits i didn’t get any chances to re visit the place. Therefore i cannot say anything about the current situation of the place.

i believe if relevant sponsors, authority can provide separate bins to dump garbage at household level and the collectors , the responsible company can send them to relevant sections, for example to ‘recycle them’ without facing big issues. I know we can manufacture compost, fertilizer using garbage you collect.

Keeping environment clean and tidy is not just single person’s responsibility or just a responsibility of a single government; it is a responsibility of every citizen. Kindly refrain from binning garbage where ever you please or you mustn’t throw things at or near public places where you find a lot of children and people gather. Children’s park for example.

I observe that very often the authorities take action to clean such surroundings but within a week or so, the places become full of garbage. Though no one can compensate the lives lost due to the incident happened. I wish the team all the best to achieve the aim, target of distributing houses, compensation allowances to the needy, fifty thousand a month until they get a house.

Kindly try to keep garbage bins in the areas where you have not kept any bins in the town areas and at the public places. Take actions against every idiot who dump the bottles, packets of food items after consuming them and polytheene as they please.

What is happened is happened. Very few has the right to talk about the things like ‘who‘s fault was that or who should take responsibility etc. Reason is solving or supporting and encouraging solving public issues is normally a responsibility of every Member of Parliament, every public servant and every government worker. And is a responsibility of every citizen of this country. Only difference is ordinary citizens do not have the power to take decisions.