There are two waterfront walks I’ve been doing for over a decade in Colombo. They are both around two Beira Lakes and their canal links. Sadly, they have become walks of shame.

It’s safe to say the country has been financially broke, we finally have hopes for a government for the people. The local authority is still however paying its management and workers, but nobody is managing and keeping the city waterfront walks clean. In particular, walkways around the lakes are filthy, unkempt, and a disgrace.

Bridges built ten years ago are now danger traps, fallen trees are not removed, block pavings are missing, and there is no maintenance or effective cleaning. There is a daily team that sweeps a bit in some areas on the small Beira Lake. Galle Face is well-kept as the work is outsourced. It’s been impossible for six months to walk around the temple of Beira Lake as trees block the path, which in itself needs repairing. The island park has not been open for years.

As someone who walks every day in the heart of the city around the lakes, it is embarrassing to take local and foreign visitors and show them our city lakes. The Lotus Tower walkway takes you only part way around the big lake, an opportunity to be taken up in the future. Furniture and lovely statues have been damaged. Garbage and partially demolished and dilapidated buildings are everywhere.

Even the water stretch around the new million-dollar City of Dreams, Cinnamon Life, is a disgrace with piles of partially burnt rubbish, missing floor blocks and railings. New electrical boxes are damaged and old ones have not been removed. Is the Electricity Board management not embarrassed?

Fancy plaques with ex-presidents’ and officials’ names are in abundance, but like the area they are in, not maintained. Like relics of some different era. At the multiple locks between the lake and the port called McCallum Gates, there is a nautical museum. The lock gates collapsed years ago and this area has become another walk of shame. Finally, work has started; we may get to this area in a year or so. In the heart of Colombo lie lakes and waterways that in any other city would be a centrepiece of attraction, history, and beauty. Today Colombo lakes are a walk of shame.