Sri Lankan president assures access to clean, safe water

 Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa assured on Monday to give citizens access to clean drinking water under his government as currently only 42 percent of the people in the country had access to clean drinking water, raising concerns over health issues, local media reported.

   Rajapaksa said that measures will be taken to increase the existing percentage of people who had access to clean and safe water so that 100 percent of the country's populace will have no issue in finding safe drinking water.

   "I am determined to make sure the future generations will not have trouble in finding safe drinking water, a threat many other countries in the region already face," Rajapaksa said.

   "Just like it was made sure that every household in the country and each area of the country have access to electricity, this too will be implemented to assure no citizen is left without having access to safe and clean drinking water," he added.

   According to official reports released last year, one of the prevalent issues identified across several areas in Sri Lanka was the lack of access to safe drinking water.

   In capital Colombo, in several villages, access to drinking water is a problem while in several other districts access to clean water was low due to the lack of rains.