Colombo Port City Project, Monster or Trans-formative Opportunity?

Since the beginning of the recent Presidential election campaign, development projects initiated or implemented by the Rajapaksa administration have come under severe criticism by the opposition, mainly on the grounds of corruption or wasteful expenditure. Although the allegations are still being made and are yet to be substantiated in a court of law it is reasonable to assume that a perception has been created among the public against corruption and malpractices. However, long term socio-economic benefits of most of these projects have not been questioned by even the anti-corruption critiques. The writer can vividly remember a similar uproar against the Accelerated Mahaweli Development Project and its numerous components during the early 1980s. In both these situations, criticisms were not necessarily on the outcomes of the project implementation but on the transparency of the processes. Among the projects initiated by the previous administration which came under severe scrutiny, the largest, most diversified and integrated development project is The Colombo Port City Project (CPCP). The purpose of this article is to highlight the salient features of this landmark project and analyse the impact of implementing a project of this nature on the Island of Sri Lanka, strategically located in the Indian Ocean.