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A “Tenth province” or Coastal authority to deal with climate change – A must for a 21st century constitution of Sri Lanka
The proposed constitution has provoked much debate, but mainly within the framework of traditional thinking with emphasis on the usual issues, i.e., “Unitary and Devolved power, the place of Buddhism, or the Executive Presidency. Whether devolution should be district-based or province-based has been debated for at least 50 years, with the same arguments being brought out. While the demand for devolution originally came from the Tamil Nationalist politicians, the majority ethnic group has not supported this, as has been the case all over the world. The ensuing violence between the government and the Tamil minority led to the entry of India into the fray. Rajeev Gandhi kept two Indian armed frigates in the Colombo harbour to impose its solution in terms of provincial devolution. But, given the first opportunity, even Prabhakaran rejected the Indian solution, fought the Indian army and assassinated Rajeev Gandhi to show his capacity for vengeance. India failed to keep its side of the agreement, making it null and void. But Sri Lanka is still in labour with the fetus of a 13A , her legs held apart by international agents and NGOs, while the mistrust between communities has long snuffed out the fetus.
The two communities are still licking their war wounds and angling to wound the other with international tribunals and sanctions. They invent new words like “Aekeeya Rajya”, and “Orumitta Nadu” but threaten each other under their breath, and over their breath, hurling accusations of genocide or of creating terrorism to break up the country. They fail to see that a major threat of global scale has completely changed the stakes.
Climate change and its dramatic effect on the maritime region.
Just after the defeat of the LTTE, in 2009 I presented a talk to a gathering of officials at the Presidential secretariat, entitled “Four Challenges to Sri Lanka and their Technological solutions”. One of the challenges was the looming danger of global warming and the rising sea level. This is a national tragedy requiring a concerted national effort. The North and a good part of the East are the most affected, and will indeed go under water even if preventive steps are launched right now.
But politicians and constitutional pundits are oblivious to the harsh reality of global warming and the rising sea levels all over the world. Sri Lanka, being at the equator will face a larger increase in the sea level than off-equitorial latitudes. Current constitutional debates ignore the most urgent issues that Sri Lanka will face in the next decade due to climate change as well as the on-going technological tsunami. I discussed how we may harness the digital revolution to our advantage in a previous article (Island, 25 September 2017) entitled “Unit of Devolution – look in cyberspace”. Someone will ask, what has climate change to do with the constitution? Here I try to show that it has everything to do with the constitution in enabling us to deal with the inundation of large parts of the country that will occur in the coming decades. The creation of an over-arching supreme authority that transcends districts, provinces, and even religious monuments since the choice is between saving the maritime region of Sri Lanka, or letting it become part of the sea.
The inter-governmental panel for climate change (IGPP) and other bodies studying climate change have published predictions of the expected rise in sea level due to global warming. Figure 1 shows the predictions done in 2013 (these documents are available at: dh-web.org/place.names/posts/CD-long-10thProv.pdf). Today it is believed that the more dangerous prediction (i.e., higher sea levels, marked RCP8.5) is most likely to hold, as most nations have defaulted in cutting down on carbon and green-house gas emissions. The rise in sea level may be as high as 0.5 to 0.8 meters within the next 15 years. This occurs with the warming of the oceans and melting of the polar caps. This is accompanied by increased humidity in the air. According to a law in chemical physics, the increase in humidity follows an exponential law, i.e., it is proportional to exp{-H/T} where H is the heat of evaporation and T is the temperature. Hence even a few degrees of heating can have a dramatic effect. The excess water and heat powers up tornadoes and torrential rain where precipitation is not in rain drops, but sheets of down pour! The world has already seen this intensified catastrophic weather events of recent times. Sri Lanka too has seen unprecedented floods, earth slips and inundation.
Fig.1 – Rise in sea level with time
The flooding pattern from recent storms are a guide to how much inundation can occur. Topographical maps show the extent of Sri Lanka’s coastal low-lying areas that go under with a one meter sea rise. In fact, the Tsunami inundation gives an extreme measure of what could happen when the sea flows in. In figure 2, the left panel shows the region inundated in the January 2011 floods, while the right panel shows the areas affected by the 2004 Tsunami, adapted from an official emergency response map issued at the time. Waves varying from one to twelve meters in height hit the shores of Sri Lanka, with the bigger waves hitting the Eastern province and the Northern province.
Fig. 2 – The map on the left shows the inundation from the floods due to rain storm in Jan 2011. The right panel shows the extent of the area affected by the 2004 December Tsunami to varying degrees.
It is not just the rise in mean sea level that matters. The dynamic level, driven by wind, waves and currents is what counts. If the sea rises by a meter, and if we can expect tsunami-like high waves due storm conditions aggravated by a heated ocean, we need a strong raised wall (bund or dyke) along the marine periphery of the Island to hold off the sea. A protective maritime region and its facilities have to be designed from the outset with a grand vision if we are to reap some benefits out of this unavoidable calamity. The protective dyke also holds a track for an electric “bullet train”, communication lines, security and heliports (for landing drones), pumps to send out flood waters and power supplies integrated into it. Constant security is essential as a breach in the bund is unthinkable.
Some one will say, “is this pure futuristic dreaming”? Not at all, drone delivery may well be an only approach under extreme conditions of flooding. Defeating terrorism was claimed to be an impossible dream. The de-mining and infra-structure development just after 2009, inclusive of the completion of the Yal Devi train in 2014 seemed an impossible dream to some economists who pointed to the 2008 market collapse. They predicted that the 300,000 IDPs rescued from Nadikadal will still be there in Manik Farm, even after a decade! They were wrong.
The region that is likely to go under water should be declared a “Tenth province”, but in effect an entity similar to the Mahweli Board, and held under the central government because of its encompassing nature, affecting the security of the whole island. The width of the maritime strip will vary as the need changes. The “10th Province is empowered to acquire any inland areas that it may needed. We have precedents for this, in the over-riding trans-provincial mandate vested in national projects like the Galoya project or the Mahaweli Project. The newly launched port city, the capital city and many other maritime cities and ports will automatically fall under the purview of the 10th province. If necessary, we may avoid the name “10th Province” and call it the Maritime Protection Authority (MPA) to avoid misunderstandings. Its powers can be legislated to deal with climate change, unstoppable rise of the sea level, tsunamis and floods, sea erosion, refugees, smuggling and naval operations, mineral rights in the sea etc. Evacuation of the residents in the coastal cities of Sri Lanka and re-settling them in higher ground will be one of the major tasks of the MPA. These are traditional powers of the central government and they can be delegated as needed. But where necessary, the constitution can be amendment. Furthermore, the “Tenth province” will effectively create a geographic “ceinture” ensuring the unitarity of the country at a level unmatchable by any constitutional tinkering.
The first maps seen in Fig. 2 shows the flooding from heavy rain that we can expect in the future. The 10th province has to acquire all of the Jaffna province and initially about 20 km inland in most provinces, even from the very outset, while this width may need further increase as the threat increases. The boundary of the 10th province will not “split” any intervening cities, but include them whole, with the need for security from the effects of global warming as the primary criterion to be satisfied.
Colombo residents know of frequent floods stretching from Colombo to Padukka, and how even the parliament in Kotte became accessible only by boat. An additional cause of storms (besides heated oceans) hides in the Indonesian sea bed. The 2011 rains storms and simultaneous flooding in many parts of the world may have been triggered by the effect on the weather due to the tipping of the Indo-Australian Plate. According to the Zetas ThinkTank, tipping up to a predicted three-meter rise along the curve under Sumatra and Java or a drop on the western side may have happened. Indonesia has likewise started to slowly sink since December 2010.
Once a dyke or bund is built to prevent the water coming in, heavy rain cannot flow out into the sea. In fact, even without the bund, the recent flood waters remain blocked by human constructions. Hence the coastal regions marked in the maps as the protective 10th province (maritime strip) will become flood basins. Existing rivers will also overflow. Their banks need to be strengthened, widened and raised – a program cutting across provincial boundaries. In addition, large-capacity flood pumps to lift the water above the dyke and discharge to the sea are needed. The energy needed has to be generated by innovative harvesting of solar and wind forces that trigger the storms, and waves in the overheated ocean. The Dutch, with a third of the land below sea level used their windmills for pumping out the water. Today electric pumps coordinated by computers and sensors do the job. Holland has voted two billion euros for their new “flood freedom for rivers” project addressing global warming, while Sri Lanka has no programs in place.
The fate of the Jaffna Peninsula.
The Jaffna peninsula is doomed for several reasons. It is a series of low-lying locations connected by causeways built during the days of the D. S. Senanayake government and prior to it, often in the face of dire opposition from Northern MPs who feared “low-caste” villages becoming “uppity” if free access becomes available. The low elevation of peninsula makes it an easy victim of inundation, as testified by both maps in Fig. 2.
Another serious problem arises from the unusual hydrology of the Peninsula. The fresh water of the Jaffnese depends on the existence (via the so-called Herzberg mechanism) of several “lenses” of fresh water supported by an underlying lens of brackish water (see Fig. 3 extracted from Sirimanne’s 1952 Presidential Address to the CAAS). The maximum thickness of a freshwater lens is roughly the thickness of the soil above the mean sea level. Hence, the rising sea will drive out and destroy the fresh water lenses. That is, besides the permanent inundation of the Jaffna peninsula, Jaffna will completely loose its water supply. Before this happens, archeological and other irreplaceable objects, places of worship etc., should be raised and protected, while the population has to be evacuated to the south. The destruction of the fresh water limestone aquifers will happen long before the actual rising of the sea level, due to more frequent marine storms and waves generated by the heightened low-pressure conditions in the Bay of Bengal.
A dyke around the Peninsula will not protect the land or its water since the sea will percolate through the lime stone via the brackish-water lens. The only way to avoid total abandonment is to build an artificial elevated city dependent on rainwater and desalination for its drinking water.
Fig 3 The hydrology of the Jaffna peninsula after Sirimanne, 1952. The salt water lens is marked “BWF”, while FWZ indicastes Fresh Water Zones. The numbers (1)-(4) indcate four types of wells. For details see Arumugam, or Panabokke and Perera, Ground Water resources of Sri lanka (2005).
The effect of global warming will have a similar serious effects on the coastal regions of Tamil Nadu. Jaffna can expect no help from TN, but there may even be refugees arriving from TN to Sri Lanka.
Given that the Jaffna Peninsula will go under the sea, and also loose its drinking water, it will be abandoned. But it is still important to have a raised dyke to access the area. The land (i.e., the peninsula) under salt water may be used for marine culture of lobsters, shrimps, crabs, cephalopods, bony fishes, sharks, batoid fishes etc. The low-lying Madakalapuwa (Batticaloa) area will also need evacuation. However, unlike in Jaffna, the Eastern coast need not loose its fresh water.
The Problem of IDPs
The rising sea level will displace everyone from the Jaffna peninsula and large parts of the remaining NP. The coastal Eastern province too will produce many IDPs. This is seen from the 2011 flood pattern as well as the 2004 map of Tsunami affected regions. As many of these IDPs will be Tamil speakers from the less fortunate strata, direct absorption into any region will be resisted by the host populations, even in preponderantly Tamil regions. Bambalapitiya, Wellawatte and such areas in the coastal belt of the 10th province will need evacuation, and the available free land will be severely limited as priority will be for coastal buffers of flood basins. Ironically, the IDP camps in Menik Farm, Dollar Farm, etc will have to be reopened and maintained indefinitely welcoming a constant stream of IDPs as the sea level rises. Judging from the Mahawamsa account, the “Manik Farm” region was known as “Mahathalithagama”, and even then housed refugees, e.g., in the 9th century, during the invasions of the Pandyan king “Sri Vallabha”!
The IDPs evacuated from the low-lying parts of the coastal cities in the south can be more easily accommodated in the central high ground. Thus we see that a major responsibility of MPA is the evacuation and re-settlement of displaced people.
The role of the remaining provinces.
Given the impact of global warming on a tiny island like Sri Lanka, she has no option but to take drastic steps. They may seem draconian today, but the more we wait, the more difficult it will be. At the beginning it will be surveyors and scientists marking out the topography and planning how to tackle the project, just as with the Mahaweli program. Once it is recognized that Jaffna is doomed, and that much of the Eastern coast will be a lake of brackish water, the leaders of the Jaffna peninsula well entrenched in Karuavkaddu (Cinnamon Gdns) will find little solace or logic in devolution. The south has never supported such devolution. Hence the provincial administrations can be disbanded and replaced with local bodies (as existed prior to 13A) to have a more efficient and inexpensive government.
In any case, all administrative entities will be subject to trans-provincial authorities like the Mahawel Board, or the MPA, i.e., the proposed 10th Province along the coast. Here we digress to review a peculiar proposal to re-demarcate the provincial boundaries along the river boundaries. In our view, it is a very retrograde proposal because one side of the river, e.g., the left bank, will be placed under one administration, while the other side of the river (right bank) will be under another administration, splitting villages bound by close kinships and commerce. In reality, the communities on both sides of the river are unified by the river, use it as a conduit for transport, fishing, social and economic activity. They are linked by ecological concerns and should not be under different administrations, as proposed by Dr. Madduma Bandara. However, since the Provincial Councils (i.e., 13 A) model becomes irrelevant under the “permanent-emergency” conditions created by global warming, PCs can be disbanded.
The cost of the project.
Someone will say, what about the cost? At the start it is only a “bund” some 900 miles along the shore, and a region with a floating inner boundary set at least 20 km inland. The MPA may have to spend as much as the state spent to fight the Eelam wars in fighting the sea. In this case it is a recurring expense that we have to maintain for decades to come. If the project is delayed the costs will mount fast, especially as other countries also face the same problems and lock up the available engineering talent and raw materials. Not doing so will devastate the whole country irrevocably and cause human suffering. The next round of floods may well engulf Meethotamulla and float the rotting garbage back to the Presidential secretariat alleged to be part of the “toxin-free nation”! A weak government cannot engage or galvanize the people to do it. It will be an immense challenge involving much pain and hardship. But doing it is a “do or die”, while the “do” will create jobs, stimulate economic activity and innovation. The modern Sri Lankans can be proud of an achievement paralleling the genius of their ancient hydraulic civilization. But if they fail, a large part of their land will become a brackish swamp, with 22 million people crowded into the middle area of the right-hand map of Figure 2, with little to eat, poor housing and subject to frequent bad weather, disease and untrammeled crime. We see it in Haiti, a land buffeted by hurricanes and other forces of nature.
The initially needed money can be raised by abandoning stupid projects destined to create more urban concrete, asphalt, and polluted spaces. The already technologically obsolete megalopolis project should be replace by a modern eco-friendly re-planning of the whole country. A good part of the “megalopolis”, being in the 10th province, will be marked out for buffer flood basins. The towns will have to evacuate to the country. Commuting to office is unnecessary as most work can be done from home online. Video-conferencing and social media usage from playing bridge to courting and flirting are now routine. All that can be personalized and less “robot-like” since holographic reality is almost at the market place. A developing country has an advantage as it can leap-frog over several stages of technology, just as Sri Lanka moved to cell-phones while skipping land-line phones. Commuting to work causes enormous traffic jams, pollution and stress. Costs of maintaining multi-lane highways, office buildings and services are staggering. They will not be viable with the battle against the sea. Cost of having office space in Colombo estimates to at least Rs. 20,000 per year per employee! It will cost more with global worming. Cost of bringing them to office is 70% of the cost of the imports of the petroleum corporation. Health costs due to stress, causing diabetes and hypertension, congestion and crime in cities etc., are incalculable. The petroleum and diesel fumes, particulate dust and other class-I toxins are more deadly than anything banned in Ven. Ratana’s so-called “toxin-free nation”.
The planned coal-fired power stations, needed to keep the megalopolis running, and the mounds of garbage that it will generate add to this megalopolis-pollution that will asphyxiate the whole nation and its ecosystem. Every roof top should be mandated to carry solar panels, and the power will be sorely needed to run the pumps pushing the regularly occurring flood waters out to sea.
We are forced to abandon the megalopolis and re-structure work, commuting etc., to save money and build the 10th province that will girdle round the island and protect it from the sea. Of course this cannot be done overnight – it will take decades. But the moment it is written into the constitution or legislated as a Maritime protection authority, defining its scope and powers, it will have a start. All the traditional provinces will give up their maritime areas in forming the 10th province. We expect ready movement of people and cultural integration within it, linking closely with the Port city being built by the Chinese.
Of course, while we are barely thinking of all this, Singapore and even Maldives have already got planners working on such protective structures that will ring their lands and keep the sea away. Holland, the masters of dykes and below-sea level lands are spending big money. All this can be true in Sri Lanka only if it can dare to have the vision and legislate for it.
The 10th Province will also ensure the unitary integrity of the land by its geographic encirclement of the whole country and administered by the central government. We can also take a cue from Singapore, which has ensured ethnic harmony by requiring that no local region will have a preponderantly mono-ethnic or mono-cultural character. The ocean will claim the “traditional homelands” claimed by Eelamists to be its own. The cry of a dissident Tamil writer speaking for the “depressed” citizens of the North will come true due to the forces of nature. Sebastian Rasalingam was a frequent voice about a decade ago. His essay on the need to “Sinhalize the North and Tamilize the South” (June 29, 2007 Sri Lanka Guardian), should be compulsory reading for the constitution makers of Sri Lanka. Ironically enough, the people of the North and the South will be forced to live in the high ground of the land, irrespective of their respective ethnic prejudices.
Siva / October 3, 2017
Another Singhala modaya talking nonsense.
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Thangamma / October 3, 2017
Well known cantankerous American resident madman with a chip on his shoulder
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Bahubootha Master / October 3, 2017
I like to know how and where Prof Dharmawardena measured those sea levels shown in the graph! Two third of the earth is covered by oceans. So which part did he measure and how?. Winters in Americaand Canada are getting colder and these ‘science merchants’ are still talking about climate change with nonsensical data. Probably we should aerially spray glyphosate all over Sri Lanka to save us from all these problems, and add a bit of Cadmium, Zinc and Fluorides to make the soup tastier and safer! When will the professors get brains?
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Champa / October 3, 2017
A brilliant article I have read after a long time. I am super impressed. Hope to write a proper comment later.
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Champa / October 4, 2017
Chandre
I hope this “Tenth Province” part is written only to grab attention from people as it is not practical.
But issues you have raised in this article worth great attention.
Melting glaciers and ice shelves largely contribute to rising sea levels which could increase tides and floods during storms and eventually submerge islands.
It is estimated that in 80 years time, the sea level in the world will rise in 3 1/2 feet, although the effect is varied from region to region. Many small island states like Kiribati, Seychelles, Maldives, Solomon Islands, Marshall Islands, Fiji, Polynesia, Cooks Islands are slowly sinking and estimated to be disappeared completely in 50 years time.
Sri Lanka is already vulnerable to sea erosion, floods, landslides and drought. No concrete measures have been taken to even minimize sea erosion and floods
I think we should start building groynes and sand dunes in most vulnerable areas in the beach.
Climate change not only affect land degradation in coastal areas, but food security, water, agriculture, fisheries, health, etc. It is time we assess socio-economic implications of the impacts on climate change on our country and push for complete implementation of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
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Bahubootha Master / October 4, 2017
What a load of crocshit! Both melting of glaciers and appearance/disappearance of islands in the Pacific have been happing since time began, What the climate change frauds are doing is taking a ‘;snap shot; of these events and deceiving the world by saying that this is a new phenomenon. When ocens rise in one region, it will be receding in another region’ This is the cycle of life the Buddha alerted us to, 3000 years ago. The climate change thieves and grant beggars are spreading fear through lies to fill their own tummies. Shame on them.
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Champa / October 4, 2017
Bahubootha Master
Though your ‘bootha’ comment doesn’t warrant a reply, let me write few lines.
On the contrary to your opinion about melting of glaciers is not a new phenomenon, global warming has contributed to the rapidity of the process as reported by the “national geographic”, 800 acres of glaciers (in 1900s) have now reduced to 300 acres and some glaciers started melting 9 days earlier than 150 years ago. According to scientists, the Himalayan glaciers will completely disappear by 2030-2035.
Your comment shows that you only care about yourself. But remember the majority of the world care about future generations.
“When oceans rise in one region, it will be receding in another region”, oh yeah, it is true for the Bootha world, where there are only seas, no lands.
North American countries are already experiencing global warming due to their own doing aka Karma. Reckless emission of greenhouse gases makes carbon dioxide stay in the air for 100 –
200 years. Even in October, the temperature in some cold countries reportedly remain at 20C which is alarming. Some countries don’t have Autumns any more, they go to Winter directly from Summer.
That is why countries like us raise our voice against emission of greenhouse gases by wealthy countries. There should be a limit for wealthy countries exploiting the nature for human greediness. There is no reason for us to pay for their sins or let them pollute the entire planet, increase earth’s warmth and change the climate.
Lord Buddha’s teaching is in line with the nature, which was not created by man. The nature when exploited by man, acts against the natural law. Nothing is permanent, Lord Buddha says. Aapo, Thejo, Pathavi, Vayo all are changing.
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El Dique / October 3, 2017
Ah, the “learned” maestro speaks again. Hail to thee, O profesori. But Sire, what will happen to the beautiful beaches of Sri Lanka, and how will you get over the perimetric 900 km long dyke to have your swim and bask in Lanka’s sunny climes, when you don your snow-bird wings and head home for Christmas?!
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old codger / October 3, 2017
What an odd mixture of unsubstantiated theories, doomsday scenarios and unlikely solutions for said doomsday scenarios, all backed up by a couple of maps showingt even Kadawata was flooded in the 2004 tsunami. And this coming from a professor who at other times is quite rational.
Really, Prof, you need sources other than the National Enquirer for your data.
I see even dear Champa is lost for words!
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Champa / October 3, 2017
Old Codger
No, he has opened vistas for something which was totally neglected by everybody. That is what is great about this type of articles.
It is time we think serious about climate change and how bad it could affect an island like ours.
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Mahadevan / October 4, 2017
This kind of thing has happened before, where vast areas of the Tamil Nadu coast and possibly Sri Lanka’s coast got covered under the seas. Mahabalipuram went under water and parts of it were seen during the 2004 Tsunami when the water receded. Later Marine archeologists relocated the ruins using Sonar.
Long ago the sea loevel was low, and the so-called “Rama Setu” was an elvated ridge along which people and animals could walk to Sri Lanka. Then, due to global warming, it too got covered up.
It is quite conceivable that ventually most coastal parts of Sri lanka and Jaffna will get claimed by the sea.
As the rate of global warming increased 100 centuries ago, and again some 40 centuries ago, the rising sea levels resulted in periodic flooding. This would have submerged prehistoric settlements that were located around the low-lying coastal areas of India and Sri Lanka. Stories of these catastrophic events may have been transmitted orally from one generation to another and finally written down as the story of Kumari Kandam.
So history will repeat again, but not in quite the same way.
Can technology save some of it as proposed by this author? Sri lankans simply will not have the managerial skills needed to get this going.
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Mudianse / October 4, 2017
Old codger@You compare a knowledge of a chemistry professor with that of a dimwit who is appointed to save the bums of the most abusive men in previous so called regime.
Old codger, please check it out well the profile of CHAMPA – the cheapest apologist of Rajaakshe propaganda network.
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Champa / October 4, 2017
Mudianse
How much did you get from Rapaksa clan to post this comment? Tell them to not to carry water in a sieve.
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Edward / October 4, 2017
The map on the 2nd figure, right hand side is the Tsunami Emergency Preparedness map. I think the author has not clearly stated what it is. If you google it you see that it is the area covered by the Tsunami PLUS the area needed to deal with the emergency.
Anyway, the response to the issues raised is surely not climate denial, but checking what has been said. In fact, the government would be very wise to appoint an expert panel to study the problem, and perhaps get help from the Dutch government who knows a lot more about keeping the sea out.
Most of us members of the public cannot make a proper evaluation of the urgency of the project, although I think it is ultimately true that the sea level will rise and engulf parts of the country if nothing is done.
This has already happened in the past in southern Tamil Nadu in historical times.
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old codger / October 4, 2017
Well, I suppose even Professors have a bee or two in the bonnet. This bee is Tamil separatism, which is to be handled by liquidating the Northern province under cover of climate change. Brilliant in a slightly insane way. BTW, the prof does look a bit bonkers in the picture.
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Jimsofty / October 3, 2017
Sri lanka had an authrotiy to look after the coastal areas, particularly to stop the sea erosion. what happened to that ?. What about other issues such as generating electrical energy with tidal waters etc.,
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K A Sumanasekera / October 4, 2017
Politikkas in Srilanka couldn’t careless about rising Ambient Temperatures or Rising Sea Levels…… They are only interested in their Rising Bank Balances………And they are doing very well there……. And Dr Ranil has made sure of it , giving them Santhosams from the day the Yahapalanaya kicked in……..Don’t take my word…….Just ask Poodle Club Baby, the one time Sinhala Buddhist aspirant for the Boss job of the UNP Sujeeva Senasinghe……………
Catalonia is in Chaos……..Yalpanam will be the same soon after Dr Ranil’s Federal Thing kicks in………But the difference is , while the West and Gutteras give Catalonians the cold shoulder, Bedouin Prince and his Blue Berets will be there in the North and at least part of the East in a flash………
Do we need a Tenth Province ?……..We certainly do……….Where are the Dalits in the Estates and even in Dr Ranil’s Capital Territory in Western Suburbs are going to live and rule themselves…….?…..
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Jimsofty / October 4, 2017
I heard this the need of a 10th province exercise is that, Estate Tamils do not want to pluck tea leaves anymore. Instead, they want thier self determination and another province for them. That is why they ask extra vegant wages for the tea plucking and Tea estates needs mechanization.———– did you get this contract from the LTTE rump living in Canada. Anyway, they are not happy with tis, they expected another kind of article.
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Anpu / October 4, 2017
When did you stop peeling cinnamon? Then did you pluck coconut or fishing?
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Jimsofty / October 5, 2017
Anpu are any of those jobs not good ?. I did ot go to other countries and did not claim a home land there, because I am not worth a dog in my own country.
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Bodin / October 4, 2017
The Jaffna peninsula can be saved if you invite one of the wealthy Islamic countries (who have experience in building cities in the Ocean – got Dubai and see) and getting them to build an ocean city on it.
They also have experience in desalination etc. They also have the Capital to invest in the project.
The Tamils are always good at playing second fiddle (i.e., they need masters, be they British, Singaporeans, or any white masters) as Bosses. They can return to Jaffna peninsula to work for the new managers. But if they are allowed to govern they begin to cut each others throats.
It is better to let Dubai manage Jaffna than converting the inundated Jaffna to mere aquaculture.
According to Captain Percival’s account of of Jaffna at the start of the 19th century, most of the residents were Muslims. So returning it to Muslims is historically the right thing to do. Anyway, all that the Tamils can do is to flee in the face of the invasion of the Jaffna Peninsula by the ocean because Wigensewarna will not think rationally. He might at best become bare-bodied and go to Nallur Temple or travel to some Temple in south India and do the mambo jambo in front of stone idols and come back! It won’t stop the ocean.
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Native Vedda / October 4, 2017
Bodin
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“The Tamils are always good at playing second fiddle”
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And we know what happened when they played second fiddle to VP the psychopath.
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Bodin / October 5, 2017
The Tamils didn’t play second fiddle to Parbhakaran. The supremo Prabhakaran was a Tamil, venerated to this day by most Tamils, and true to form, Prabhakaran probably killed more prominent tamils and rival tamil leaders than the whole Sinhalese army plus all sinhalese kings put together. That is what happens when a Tamil gets the tiop position. They perform best as civil servants doing what their master tells them to do.
The swallowing up of Jaffna is divine retribution for kicking out the Muslims and the Sinhaese from Jaffna by the LTTE; and now the Tamils have got hold of Yasmin Sooka and other Dobhi women to wash of their sins and lay it thick on the Sinhalese.
Remember, the most enlightened and liberal rulers of South Asia were the Mogul rulers of India.
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R. Varathan / October 5, 2017
Native V – You probably missed the undernoted comments I made reading Sivathasan’s article. Our Southern politicians, I dare say except the NEP variety that fights for their pre-1515 lost rights, are simply flogging a dead horse (viz:- bankrupt Sri Lanka)
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Dear Native V
Nice work. Not merely humour but much satire too.
Our Sinhala cousins aimed to reduce the Tamils to insignificant, 2nd class status from the mid-1950s – under the able leadership of the Sangha. What they have succeeded so far is to ruin themselves – probably beyond redemption. Today the indispensable Coconut that every household needs sells at Rs.100. For the first time C’nuts are sold in halves. In some places in Colombo, even in smaller measures in the form of packeted Powdered C’nuts. Won’t be long before we may see the hungry turning into violent mobs – breaking into food outlets. Remember Argentina – not long ago?
Personally, I have no objection to the Maha Nayakas taking over – similar to their counterparts in theocratic Iran. Their role has negated our system of governance. I suspect the Iranian example must have been in their minds for sometime.
Democracy has been killed in Sri Lanka. Let’s thank the Rajapakse family for the family for the final death blow. Sri Lanka cannot avoid disintegration – through her own mismanagement. The Tamil areas might just save themselves – aided by our neighbours. That is, unless the economic tsunami destroys us before the political disaster. Very soon we will have to print Rs.10,000 and Rs.50,000 notes in the lines of what Germany suffered post-WW2 and more
recently Zimbabwe. I am not wishing the country ill – but that, sadly, is the stark reality.
R. Varathan
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Jimsofty / October 5, 2017
I think NP has begun it. they want Bangladeshi Migrents from Myanmar in the North. Again, it looks like betting on the wrong horse. Np needs wealthy Wahabis and not the shias.
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Pygmalion / October 4, 2017
The Greenland Ice-Sheet is the largest mass of ice in the Northern Hemisphere covering an area of about 7 times the size of the UK and reaching upto 3KM[2Miles] in thickness.
A 5year UK project known as Black and Bloom is underway to investigate the Greenland Ice sheet and then to use this knowledge to improve computer projections of future sea level rise.
The UN panel study said that the worst case scenario was a rise of 98cm by the end of the century.But if the WHOLE of the Greenland Ice-Sheet melted the average sea level would rise around the World by about 7metres,more than 20ft! The Million dollar question would be WHEN?
Coastal Cities as far apart as Miami,London and Shanghai and low lying areas in Bangladesh and part of Britain will go under the sea.
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Plato. / October 4, 2017
So Bodin the only way to save the Jaffna Peninsula when it is circumscribed by the Ocean,as a result of the Climate change, is for its residents to go for Circumcision?
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SathyaMurthy / October 5, 2017
What has happened to the comments of Engineers who talked about “Rivers for Jaffna” in the context of this article?
Is this reasonably good science or not?
Even now Jaffna becomes so hot that when I come here from Canada I find it unbearably hot compared to what I knew of the place long ago.
If there is global warming heating up Jaffna and Batticaloa areas, are we going to have 40 to 50 degrees Celsius as a matter of routine?
Let us hear from Tamil Technical minds who know the North, unlike this writer who probably only visited the place a couple of times as a tourist, as most southern Sinhalese do.
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Bodhi / October 6, 2017
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