By Paneetha Ameresekere
The World Bank will be having a week-long conference concerning the use of the Nile river water at one of the world’s most expensive cities, Tokyo, Japan, beginning on April 18.

Some 30 participants from all over the world are expected to attend this seminar, World Bank representatives told journalists at a Bank co-sponsored workshop on ‘Water’ which was held at Chennai (Madras) last week.

Participants at this workshop included journalists from Sri Lanka. The journalists, in response to this announcement, asked the World Bank representatives whether it would not have been better if this Nile conference was held in a country like Egypt, which, unlike Japan, is a direct beneficiary of the waters of the Nile.

In reply, the World Bank representatives said that the Tokyo conference was only a preliminary one, which made one wag to remark that this may well mean that the Bank would probably be holding a second conference on the Nile, in a country that directly benefits from the waters of this river.

"If so, is this not more wasteful expenditure of the First World’s tax-payers’ money? Could not the World Bank in the first place have organised just one such seminar, including field visits, in a country, as said earlier, that is directly benefited from the waters of the Nile? Wouldn’t such a move have been cheaper to the Bank, and more beneficial to the participants? Rather than holding this conference in an expensive city such as Tokyo?" he asked.