Edit in Ceylon Today, March 21, 2023
If the Sri Lankan Government is notorious for one thing, that is to maintain ‘white elephants’. From Provincial Councils with a hefty -maintenance cost and a questionable efficiency to ever-expanding ministries, Government institutes, that run constantly at losses and to a few establishments that hardly make any profit at all, there are lots of Government ventures that give nothing in return to drawing tax payers’ money to merely exist.
The latest of such establishments recently came under the limelight as the authorities eventually came to the obvious conclusion that running the establishment with Government money without any profits is simply not sustainable. Airport and Aviation Services Sri Lanka (AASL) has submitted a proposal to the Civil Aviation Authority of Sri Lanka (CAASL) to decommission the Batticaloa International Airport as it costs approximately Rs 15 million a month to maintain, but does not earn any revenue of significance.
The need for an airport in Battialoa is uncontested since air travel can reduce the travel time by significant margins. While a drive from Colombo to Batticaloa would take four to five hours, a domestic flight will only take about an hour from Ratmalana to Batticaloa. The question is whether there really is a need to upgrade Batticaloa Airport to an international airport since we already have four such airports, two of which are struggling to turn a profit.
Throughout the history of Sri Lankan politics, decisions to invest in large-scale and attractive infrastructure development projects has been taken purely to please the masses and to inspire awe, to gain popularity, and to do one over one’s political opponents rather than considering the necessity, financial feasibility, and environmental impacts of these projects; the story of Batticaloa International Airport too is no different.
Batticaloa Airport was opened in 1958 as a domestic airport and about a decade later when Air Ceylon started operating domestic flights between Ratmalana and Batticaloa via Gal Oya, the airport became much popular among the public, especially among Government employees. The airport flourished courtesy the domestic flights but as Air Ceylon went out of business in the late ‘70s the airport also lost some of its popularity. During the internal conflict of the country the operations of the airport were taken over by the Sri Lanka Air Force and the area was declared a high-security zone.
After the conflict was resolved talks about renovating the airport and opening it to the public began, but there were some major issues regarding the development project. For one, the extension possibility of the runway was severely limited since it was located in a narrow peninsula surrounded by the Batticaloa Lagoon on three sides. Moreover, there were no domestic airlines interested in starting flight operations with the Batticaloa Airport which raised some serious questions as to how the airport is going to make any profit. Despite all the issues, then President Maithripala Sirisena went ahead with the renovation project which cost approximately Rs 1.4 billion and opened the airport in July 2016. The decision was regarded by many as President Sirisena’s attempt at following suit of previous President Mahinda Rajapaksa who brought an international airport to his home district, Hambantota. President Sirisena was in such a hurry to open the airport that he forgot to up the standards of the airport to conform to civil aviation requirements. As a result, domestic flights could not commence from the airport for another two years and all the while the airport was in operation at a loss.
When Indian Government decided to fund the developments of the Jaffna Airport, the civil society groups of the East questioned the ‘favouritism’ of India towards the North while ignoring the East where a considerable Tamil population was living. To maintain the appearance of transparency the Indian Government agreed to fund the renovations of Batticaloa Airport and to please the local community and to secure their votes, then Government decided via a Cabinet approval, to lift the status of the airport which was already running at a loss to an international airport. Long story short, the airport has attracted hardly any international flight and has been running at a pure loss thus far and hence, the AASL’s decision to decommission the airport and use it for domestic operations and aviation training.
Batticaloa International Airport isn’t the only ‘white elephant’ Government project and in fact, it is even not the only airport that is running at a loss. Despite a report produced by International Air transport Association claiming Sri Lanka would be better off investing in a second runway at Bandaranaike International Airport, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa anyway went on to build the Mattala International Airport in Hambantota. Dubbed by the Forbes magazine as the ‘emptiest airport in the world’, Mattala, at one time, had tourists not as international arrivals but as passers-by who had stopped to witness the rare emptiness of an international airport. The whole Mattala Airport Project was Rajapaksa’s attempt at proving to the people that he hadn’t forgotten his roots. Whether he had managed to convince the people of this is questionable, what is certain without a doubt is that ten years since its inception, Mattala International Airport is still struggling to turn a profit.
While the Government is feeding these ‘white elephants’, the Bandaranaike International Airport is still waiting for necessary infrastructure extensions which could actually help make profits. No wonder the country is facing an economic crisis.
https://ceylontoday.lk/2023/03/20/batticaloa-airport-another-white-elephant/
