21 December 2021 08:04 pm Views - 609
The Resettlement Ministry has allocated 16,000 houses for families of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) within the past three years, including 6000 houses sanctioned this year alone, the government's special facilitator for North and East, Geethanath Cassilingham said.
In a statement on his Twitter account, Cassilingham said a rapid resettlement program was ongoing by the Resettlement Ministry, under the instructions of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, and the number of families in IDP camps was now closing in.
"Despite the obstacles by the COVID-19 pandemic which slowed the growth of several sectors, the Resettlement Ministry was able to continue providing funds and land to settle the families in the IDP camps. The number of families remaining in these camps is now minimal which is why the government is aiming to close the camps in the north by sometime next year," Cassilingham told Daily Mirror.
Jaffna presently had the highest number of families awaiting resettlement followed by Vavuniya and Batticaloa.