Gota says villagers provoked

Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa has said that the Weliweriya drinking water dispute was settled satisfactorily. However he said that in the meantime certain vested elements provoked the villagers into needless confrontations, the Government information department reported.

Rajapaksa said that the protesting public were satisfied with the solution offered to close a factory, which allegedly caused the contamination of water in the area, but those with political motives provoked some of the residents to stage protests. Meanwhile, the Minister of Water Supply and Drainage Dinesh Gunawardena has said that drinking water wells in the Weliweriya area in the Gampaha District had become polluted as a result of untreated chemical effluents coming from the industries. He has said that the National Water Supply and Drainage Board will ensure the distribution and treatment of water and has made arrangements to provide clean drinking water to the public in Weliweriya through its mobile water supply units and browsers.