New building soon for Customs

Fully equipped with state-of-the-art facilities:

By Dhameshi Yatawara

Beira Lake has been the landmark of the Colombo city for centuries.

Beira lake, an overflow of the Kelani river is surrounded by many important businesses of the bustling Colombo metropolitan. Adding to these landmark buildings those which take care of crucial businesses of the country, another milestone is being built by Sri Lankan engineers. The new building will symbolise the majesty of one of the oldest Sri Lankan Government organisations which earns almost 53% of the State revenue.

This is the new house of the Sri Lanka Customs. This is a key State organisation at the frontier, which enforces social protection laws of the country while facilitating the trade transactions, contributing to the national development drive. Yet the Sri Lanka Customs worked scattered in different buildings even at the time of their bicentenary celebrations. At a cost of Rs. 4.5 billion the new Customs building is being built near the Charmer’s jetty in Colombo Fort with one side bordered by the Beira Lake.

“Sri Lanka is speedily heading towards development showing drastic growth in the economy. When business gets on to fast forward motion the imports and exports processes desperately need to expedite,” said Additional Director General (Corporate Cluster) Ajantha Dias, the spokesperson of the Sri Lanka Customs. “During official discussions on national development, President Mahinda Rajapaksa points out the importance of facilitating the entrepreneurs for the smooth running of the businesses that are required for the economic growth of the country,” Dias said.

In order to facilitate the growing demand the Customs needed to make their processes flexible and easy which was quite demanding. Collecting taxes, duties and other levies as imposed by the government, ensuring proper enforcement of tariff, trade and social protection policies of the State and monitoring the flow of passengers, goods and related means of transport is no simple task.

Sri Lanka Customs comes under the purview of the Ministry of Finance of which President Mahinda Rajapaksa is the Minister. Sri Lanka Customs is one of the oldest government departments, established in 1806.

The eleventh floor earmarked for the restaurant

With the introduction of the Customs Ordinance, it developed into a fully fledged State organisation responsible for the collection of revenue and the enforcement of law. Today, headed by Sudharma Karunarathne as the Director General, it has a staff of over 2000. Customs officers are employed at various points around the island and two of the key points are at the Bandaranaike International Airport and the Colombo Sea Port.

Heavy responsibilities

Though started in 1806, Sri Lanka Customs have established themselves as one office in a building only by 1869. According to the records available with the Customs this first office has been located at Chaitya road in Colombo Fort. For 115 years (until 1984) the Customs headquarters were in this office. With the change of the economy of the country heavy responsibilities were loaded on the Customs. To expand their work they needed more space.

In the early ‘80s it has been planned to establish a new building next to the first headquarters of the Customs, yet unfortunately it never got implemented. Thus in 1984 Customs shifted to Grindlay’s Bank building and in 1985 to the Times building. Times building could not accommodate all the departments of the Customs, hence they had to rent out several other office premises close by.

In 1999 the Customs received a two acre land located within the premises of the Charmer’s jetty as a result of the heavy demand from all the trade unions of the Customs. On November 3, 2005 the foundation stone was laid by the then Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa at a grand event. Soon after Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa took oaths as the President of the Country.

In 2006, under the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime money was allocated on Cabinet approval to start construction of the new building.

“With the liberation of the North and the East the Sri Lankan market expanded and with that it is apparent that there will be an increase in the imports and exports. Sri Lanka Customs need to adjust to the new environment and the new building will be a great boost for us,” Sri Lanka Customs spokesperson Dias said.

“The new building is fully equipped with state of the Art facilities.

With that it becomes one of the few highly sophisticated State owned buildings,” Additional Director General Duminda Jayaratna said. Now the construction work of the super structure is complete. The complicated task gives finishing touches to the building is under way. “The new building has been made sophisticated for a purpose. With new technology, safety and security are guaranteed with energy saving while avoiding inconveniences to providing an effective service,” Jayaratna added.

Building Management System

“The main feature is the Building Management System,” said Director (Logistics) Asanga Dayarathne. As he explained a Building Management System is where the building is controlled by one control room. This looks in to the safety, security, energy saving of the building. The Building Management System (BMS) monitors and controls the entry/exit points, temperature control of separate areas as well as taking action in emergencies such as a fire.

“The building will be 52 metres tall and top of the building there will be a communication tower of 25 metres height,” Dayarathne said.

In the present procedure the shipment clearing agents and every customer has to run around in Colombo Fort taking documents, samples of the shipment etc to the different offices of the Customs. As most of the documentation work is now can be done online, exporting and importing has become less hectic for the public. The new building will house 21 divisions of the Customs while the Preventive Divisions in the Port and Airport will not be shifted. “With the new developments we only need to upgrade physically,” Dayaratne said.

The Building is in three blocks - A, B and C. A and C blocks have five floors while the B block has 11 floors, explained the Chief Architect Hyacinth Ranasinghe of the State Engineering Corporation. Under the supervision of the State Engineering Corporation a private constructing firm is carrying out the construction works. “When planning first this we thought was giving the Customs a unique identity. It is a frontier organization among both the public and private sector. And being in different places the Customs could not develop an identity for themselves,” Ranasinghe said. Sri Lanka Customs is a place with high public traffic where nearly 2000 customers enter daily to get their work attended to, in addition to the over 2000 employees. Sri Lanka Customs is not the conventional nine to five working place. It should be serving, monitoring and regulating the importation and exportation around the clock.

The designers planed the new building to showcase the dignity of this esteemed organisation. In the total building area of 400,000 square feet this building will have 10 lifts and four escalators. One will be an observation lift that will give a spectacular view of the Colombo city. Others will be four high speed passenger lifts and two service lifts as well as two fire lifts. A special lab will be set up inside the new building to test samples of shipments. Certain selected shipments need to be tested to verify the consignment.

Public accommodation

The first, second and third floors are with comparatively large spaces to accommodate the public the floors above this will be basically for office purposes. The building has three restaurants - one will be in the ground floor for the public and another in the ninth floor for the employees. A specially designed restaurant will be in the top floor of the B block for top executives and foreign delegates. Rest rooms are designed separately for Custom officers on shift basis as well as for foreign dignitaries attending special seminars held in the Customs.

The new building will have all the high-tech gadgets. Public addressing system, new telecommunications, data cabling, access controlling and CCTV monitoring are some of the key figures of the building.

Designing this to last for generations the architects are using only high quality branded material. During the piling works 550 piles had to be buried 25 - 30 metres deep. “Piling took nine months since this had to be built on a strong base,” Ranasinghe added.

Water recycling system is in the building and the recycled water will be used for hygienic purposes and vehicle cleaning. In order to maintain the coolness reducing the scorching heat of the Colombo Fort the architects have designed a picturesque water curtain at the edge of the main lobby.

With all these beautifying works and ensuring durability Sri Lanka Customs plans to establish themselves in the new house by mid next year. Thus the next generation of the Customs will be blessed with a dignified future as a result of the hard work and dedication of the present generation. They are the eyes and ears that monitors Sri Lankan doorstep. With this new chapter in the Sri Lanka Customs history they will surely continue for many centuries adjusting themselves to the new trends of the world.

Pix: Thilak Perera.