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| Sunday, 1 August 2004 |
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White elephants all the way Light Refractions by Lucien Rajakarunanayake The story that a white elephant had been spotted at the Yala National Park was big news last week. While wildlife enthusiasts and zoologists can delight in this spotting, there are others who also have their own interests in this find. There were several members of the UNP who said the phenomenon of a white elephant was nothing strange to them as they were dominated by a white elephant who had led them to defeat in 13 elections bar two, since 1994. Others in the UNP said there were other white elephants there too, who had jumped the fence on to their side, with all of them having a blackened record in politics and, one of them even given the black nickname, Kaluvara Mahinda. His offspring had recently damaged public property in the form of traffic lights, and once again brought the party to disrepute. While the UNP can be left to solve its problems of white elephants in the herd, with one of them leading it too, I was more interested in a different type of white elephant that has become a bane to this country in the past few decades. The virtual creation of white elephants is a cross-party pastime of politicians and so-called experts in economics and development, which makes one wonder whether there is any other society saddled with so many white elephants that make the new find at Yala pale into insignificance. Not so long ago there was much said about his country being made self-sufficient in milk. Foreign breeds of cattle known for large yield of milk were imported and distributed to dairy farmers. Ambewela was the centre of activity in this special pride in animal husbandry. Many years have gone by and the entire project remains a milk white elephant, while our children are raised on a diet of powdered milk, from cows that graze at grass fields in New Zealand or Denmark. With all faith placed on Fresian and other high milk yielding bovines from abroad hardly suitable for our climate, the milk project has been curdled, and the hardy local cow that can withstand the strains of tropical conditions are being killed by the hundred daily, despite a ban on the slaughter of cows and calves, bringing this natural resource to near extinction. If that was the milky way to nurture a white elephant the next is the sweet way of doing it. One government after another has alienated thousands of hectares of good forest land or land already brought under the plough with good paddy yields, to taste the sweetness of local sugar. Whether it is Pelwatte, Kantalai or Hingurana, all these stretches of sugar have only helped in damaging the environment, causing great harm to the elephants living in these parts, and making wage slaves of once proud rice cultivators, while the country is nowhere near even a semblance of self-sufficiency in sugar. Every year we continue to import shiploads of sugar, and give subsidies to importers who make a fortune from the sweet deals that are made. How many have spotted the white elephant in this political craze for local sugar? It was many years ago that none other that Philip Gunawardena, as Minister of Industries established the massive plywood factory at Kosgama. It was a factory with massive capacity and, if it worked all three shifts daily as planned, we would have all the plywood we need and even more. It would also have meant the ultimate total destruction of the Sinharaja Forest to supply the raw material for the factory, although that was not Philip Gunewardena's intention. The factory now remains closed. It is a monument to bad planning and unrealistic expectations, another white elephant in the path to progress. From wood to fertilizer, when the Sapugaskanda Fertilizer Factory complex was established it devoured large acres of land. Much was said of its capacity and even a special railway line was laid to the complex to transport its produce. But the trains could not do many runs before the factory closed down, with whatever aid or local funds used for it gone bust. The rail track and sleepers were taken away by locals and traders for their own profit, while the huge land where the complex was sited became the ideal place for squatters. But for this becoming a white elephant that guzzled funds, the country may have been relieved of the burden of the high cost for imported fertilizer; the government would not have to bear a huge burden on fertilizer subsidies, and fertilizer may not even be a political slogan of a such importance. Whatever we do, we do it in great style. The textile plants at Pugoda and Thulhiriya were huge installations, built at great cost, even with large components of foreign aid. One of them was described as the largest textile factory in all of South Asia, if not Asia. Yet, the contrasting policies of different governments have led to the ultimate failure of both these plants, making them white elephants, where even later private owners did not pay the wages and EPF contributions of the employees. One wonders whether the efforts to palm off at least one of these white elephants to Chinese investors would bear fruit. Hopefully the Chinese have their own way of changing the colour of elephants from white to black or the even the usual grey. None of these projects can beat the Accelerated Mahaweli Scheme, for its enormity as a white elephant. When the scheme was initiated, prior to acceleration after 1977, the late Mr. Maitripala Senanayake even said the diverted Mahaweli could produce sufficient power that we could sell the excess to India. But with acceleration, and the telescoping of a 30-year project into six years, came the great destruction. The Mahaweli Scheme has not lived up to its promise on power supply, and has not kept to all the hopes regarding irrigation, either. Instead, it has caused massive environmental damage due to cutting down of vast acres of jungle, displaced thousands of people and submerged their traditional habitats, rapidly exacerbated the human elephant conflict, paved the way for the present increase in landslides, built reservoirs that are heavily silted and also caused a significant and unwelcome change in rainfall patterns. Space does not permit a longer listing of white elephants. But, judging by any standard, the Accelerated Mahaweli Scheme was not just a single white elephant but a whole herd of them. It is today a sad monument to bad planning by government, which is the usual cause of all white elephants that burden a country. One can only wish that the sighting of the white elephant at Yala is a sign that we will be spared the white elephants bred in the name of development, and that nature's own white elephants thrive in the confines of the little forest cover that is left. |
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