The Highways Department will seek additional budget in fiscal 2008 to support the planned construction of a new motorway to connect Bang Pa-in and Nakhon Sawan province to compensate the people whose properties will have to be expropriated for the construction of the new highway.

Director-general Songsak Paecharoen said the Highways Department was trying to accelerate the disbursement of budget to compensate people whose rice fields would have to be expropriated.

Earlier, the residents in Payuha Khiri District in Nakhon Sawan province, mostly rice farmers, came out strongly against the Highways Department's plan to construct the new intra-city highway, saying that it was not necessary for them to leave the fields which had been their living for generations.

The Highways Department plans to construct the Bang Pa-in-Nakhon Sawan motorway in fiscal 2008. Chaisawad Kittipornpibul, permanent secretary of the Transport Ministry, has told the Highways Department to work out a plan in the next fiscal year.

Originally the Highways Department was allocated a budget of Bt900 million for land expropriation, even though it had requested Bt5 billion. In fiscal 2008 it is seeking Bt3 billion for that purpose.

The Bt25.2-billion motorway will generate income for the department as a toll will be collected.

However, the farmers in Nakhon Sawan, the Kingdom's rice-producing centre, said they opposed the project. Village headman Surapol Pan-ngam said that late last month around 300 farmers in the district had gathered at the District Hall to discuss the impact of the highway. They wanted the government to suspend the plan.

"The government never consulted us, even though public participation is required," he said.

He saw the new motorway as unnecessary because the Asian Highway from Bangkok to the northern provinces runs through the area and the government has expanded it to eight lanes.

Pratuan Prabhakorn, a member of the Tambon Administrative Organisation, said he had not been informed of the project until when the study was almost complete.

The construction will affect people in 11 villages with a combined population of around 7,500. The major source of income in the area is rice farming because of its fertile soil.

The residents were informed of the project on February 20 when an advisory team commissioned by the government told them of the final stage of the study. They were informed that they would receive Bt30,000 per rai.

Most said they did not want to abandon their fields.

"What we will do with Bt30,000 if we have no fields left?" asked Thawatchai Nadee, a leader of the community in Moo 11 village.

Watcharapong Thongrung

The Nation