ABDF

A view of Peace Village.

Peace Village is a tsunami resettlement village of 100 households, which officially opened in October 2007, almost three years after the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami. Most of the refugees hail from the Kattankudy area, a predominately Muslim enclave 7 km south of Batticaloa. Before the current civil conflict, Christians, Hindus and Muslims lived side-by-side in harmony. In an effort to reintegrate the various religious groups, the main sponsors of Peace Village, Muslim Aid UK, mandated that at least 25% of the households be reserved for non-Muslims. As of October 2007, all households have been filled.

One of the major problems the villagers are encountering is the lack of paved roads in the resettlement camp. Currently, the roads in the village are merely packed sand and dirt. This years’ rainy season perfectly illustrated why this sort of track is not functional; the monsoon rains immediately turned the roads into a morass of thick gooey sludge, making walking hazardous and filthy at best, and making any sort of driving nearly impossible.

Our local partner on this project, Firthous (in the baseball cap), and the village headmen.

In the long term the village hopes to pave its roads with tamarack (blacktop) but the expense required is currently beyond the means of the village (as well as ABDF.org) and along the East Coast the government only paves main highways and the streets of the main towns. As a short- to medium-term solution, the village is seeking to gravel the roads. This will last several years, allowing the village to prepare for the expense of laying asphalt. Gravel roads, while not a perfect solution, do provide greatly increased drainage and stability.

The 2004 tsunami destroyed the main hospital in Kattankudy, which is about 7 km from Ollikulam. The Norwegian Red Cross is currently tearing down the remains of the old hospital, and will build a new one on the site. They have agreed to let Peace Village use the rubble for the gravel road, providing the villagers transport the materials to Olliklam at their own expense.

Recycle, reuse. Kattankudy Hospital, the source of rubble for the Peace Village road.

The headmen of Peace Village have asked ABDF.org to help pay for this transport. Our $1,000 sponsorship will pay for over 200 cartloads of the material to be hauled from the hospital site to Peace Village. The villagers themselves will crush the rubble into gravel and lay the bed. ABDF.org expects that this will provide a good gravel road for the two main roads that run through the village.

Road in progress!

This project will result in an immediate benefit to those 100 households, the occupants of who, until the fall of 2007, have been living in clapboard shacks and tents. The goal of re-integrating religious groups together is an admirable one. Thus this project falls well into the parameters set by ABDF.org of small scale yet immediate impact.

Please note that this is an ongoing project; as the hospital is slowly demolished over the next year or two, the rubble will be taken to the road site.