Roads a bridge between North, South - President

COLOMBO: President Mahinda Rajapaksa made a clarion call to Road Development Authority engineers to commit themselves to merge the gap between the North and the South through the development of road structures in the island.

He was addressing the Road Development Authority Engineers Association Annual General Meeting at the Presidential Secretariat yesterday.

"When the World Bank President came here I spoke to him about the possibility of getting funds to build a highway linking the North and the South. I hope this would materialise as the Road to Peace," President said.

Reiterating the Government's commitment to development against the backdrop of any adverse implications, the President highlighted the importance of developing road infrastructure as a catalyst to development and peace.

"As a Government committed to development we have paid special attention to the development of infrastructure. Our ancestors received world acclaim for their achievements in engineering. Our duty should be to use this as a catalyst in developing a hassle free and development oriented road structure for our future generation," the President said.

"Roads could be used to bridge the gap between village and the city and could be used as a catalyst to prospective investments both local and foreign".

"As the guardians of the roads in our country,the responsibility of future growth is on your shoulders. As such you should take it to your heart to do justice to the free education you received and the faith we all have placed on you with a committed effort to development," he added.

Highways Minister Jeyaraj Fernandopulle hailed the occasion as a historic one.

"This is the first time a meeting of this nature is being held at the Presidential Secretariat. That in itself shows the Government's stance on the development of roads as a high priority issue".

"Korea has 4,000 km of highways and China has 40,000 km, but we do not even have one kilometre. As such we should all commit ourselves to developing this most important type of infrastructure. We have launched several highway projects," Fernandopulle added.

Both T.B.Ekanayake Minister of Road development and his deputy Rohana Kumara Dissanayake stressed the importance of developing the 64,600 Km road network in the island. Citing a World Bank report Dissanayake said that poverty was prevalent in areas where the road structure was poor. "We should change the trend and use better roads to develop the villagers."

Chairman of the Association Moses Mariyadasan reiterated their commitment to road development behalf of all his colleagues. A web site was launched depicting the work of RDA.