10 Countries Where The Capital Isn’t The City That You’d Expect

Yep. I don’t know how to pronounce it either.

In the vast majority of cases, a government choosing a new capital opts for a location that is geographically far out from their existing base, allowing them to build what they require from scratch. The government of Sri Lanka, however, decided to move less than ten miles from Colombo in 1982, choosing the satellite town of Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte (which has to rival Burkina Faso’s Ouagadougou and Honduras’ Tegucigalpa for its ability to roll effortlessly off of the tongue) as their new home.

In 1983, the main focus of the government became a Civil War with the Tamil Tigers, which would be waged for twenty six years until 2009 as the latter party sought to carve out their own Tamil state. As a result, many governmental functions still remain in Colombo, as do the vast majority of the embassies of other countries, making the switch look like a half-finished project.

SJK wasn’t specifically planned as a capital, so its infrastructure, outside of the artificial island that was created in Diyawanna Lake for new parliament buildings (which are visually appealing but hardly practical), is lacking.

Colombo therefore remains far more prominent than its successor (most recently sadly because of the six terrorist bombings earlier this year that claimed 259 lives).

As the two continue to encroach on each other as a result of population growth, the logical thing to do would be to unite the pair under one banner one day soon.