![new sri lanka map new sri lanka map](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41VG-N9NUiL._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg)
That airport would have kept a variation on its old name. Earlier plans, vetoed on environmental grounds, had been for the military airport at Weerawila to be converted into an international hub (Weerawila being not merely in Hambotota, but the President’s actual birthplace). That probably made some sort of sense in the abstract: Hambotota is the President’s home district. Perhaps inspired by this tradition, Rajapaska’s government decided to name the new airport after another influential Sri Lankan political family: his own. Their daughter Chandrika would be elected President in 1994 their son Anura has variously been a minister, speaker of the parliament and leader of the opposition.
![new sri lanka map new sri lanka map](https://adaderanaenglish.s3.amazonaws.com/1563729931-Sri-Lanka-launches-new-official-map-featuring-Chinese-investments-B.jpg)
A year later, his widow followed him into that office winning election by a landslide, and in the process becoming the world’s first female Prime Minister. SWRD Bandaranaike, founder of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party and Prime Minister from 1956-59, died in office, assassinated by a Buddhist monk. The existing Bandaranaike airport was named in honour of the political dynasty of same name. Located near the proposed Hambotota Sport City, earmarked as the site for Sri Lanka’s bid for the 2018 Commonwealth Games, the project was seen as a catalyst for the economic regeneration of a poor agricultural area, principally known to Sri Lankans as the birthplace of the warrior king Dutugemunu (161BC-137BC), a sort of Sinhalese Henry V.
![new sri lanka map new sri lanka map](https://cdn.europosters.eu/image/1300/art-photo/sri-lanka-color-i103838.jpg)
There’s only one problem: almost literally nobody is using it.