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| Sunday, 18 July 2004 |
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Dubious land deals:LRC flexes muscles The Government has decided to take back government lands alienated and leased by certain Statutory Agencies without proper approval of the Land Reforms Commission (LRC) during the last UNP regime. A special Presidential Committee has revealed that these land transactions and alienation have violated laws and procedures. The Committee even has found out that just as the UNP Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe provided opportunities for his relatives to buy over 20,000 acres of government lands at cheap prices in 1990, a number of the last UNP regime top ranking officers have also done the same thing. The President has several times alerted out Cabinet of Ministers about this quick disposal of lands even after the dissolution of the Parliament to politically aligned persons. She has also pointed out that LRC lands are alienated for viable agricultural and other development projects under a transparent scheme and those should not be allocated preferentially on an ad-hoc basis to individuals. The Cabinet of Ministers has found out that land alienation most of the time had been done by the relevant Minister and the Chairman at that time on direct requests and recommendations by MPs and several other politically influential persons. In some occasions no project proposals have been submitted and some sketchy proposals have not been even evaluated or examined by any relevant authority. These irregularities by the previous regime has already brought substantial loss of revenue to the LRC Therefore, the Cabinet has decided to advice the LRC to cancel such alienation which they have not approved and to stop any ongoing action for the eventual handing over of possessions. According to a Cabinet paper presented by the President on May 24 over 2600 acres which were distributed are plots of over 10 acres. Over 700 acres of lands have been alienated in Galle and 201 in Kandy. Lands had been reserved in this way in the districts of Gampaha, Ratnapura, Puttalam, Nuwara-Eliya, Badulla, Matara, Kalutara and Matale. Meanwhile, plantations Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa has prepared a list of the alienated lands of which 683 transactions are illegal. |
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