Interior Minister Nikos Nouris held a meeting with the Advisory Committee for the Management of Turkish Cypriot (T/C) properties at the Press and Information Office amphitheatre.
After the meeting, in a statement to reporters, he said.
And our proposal includes, among other things,
- Pointing out our weaknesses, but also distortions that are currently observed
- Establishment of new criteria and procedures for the allocation of these properties always in favor of refugees
- Introduction of criteria and mechanisms for the allocation in the right way of both residential and agricultural plots and, of course, commercial premises, in such a way that the custodian of the T/C properties will become, among other things, financially viable - something that is not the case today, i.e. covering the deficits that exist - while our proposal provides refugees with additional rights in order to give them an incentive to invest in the properties allocated to them. Such as, for example, the granting of inheritance or subletting rights.
- On the other hand, the guardian also assumes additional obligations towards the tenants, such as, for example, improving the infrastructure in terms of structural adequacy so that the buildings in question are buildings which, once they are handed over to the tenants, can be put to better use.
The aim and objective is, as I have said, to untie the state, the guardian, from the current problematic and not at all rational procedures that exist and that we have been discussing and pointing fingers for years, without any holistic attempt to intervene and correct them.
Today, then, our policy was presented. We have renewed the Advisory Committee meeting to give members a period of 10-15 days to come back with their own suggestions.
We will be ready within this timeframe, the Ministry of Interior - and with the amendment of the legislation, which will immediately be submitted to the House of Representatives, and will of course be discussed in the relevant Parliamentary Committee - to rationalize, I repeat holistically for the benefit of the real beneficiaries, but also for the benefit of the state, the policy for the management of T/C property."
Asked about the benefits of these changes for citizens, the Minister replied that "today there are many distortions."
He continued that "starting from the chapter of distortions we will reach the chapter of utility."
He added that the distortions lie in the fact that today there are oddities, noting that these oddities relate to yes with beneficiaries, who manage or own vast amounts of T/C property, giving the example of an owner of 49 thousand square meters, who pays a rent of 28 euros a year, he said.
"These distortions are not only unacceptable. They are also distortions that create two serious problems and that deprive us of the right to give the real beneficiaries what they are really entitled to," he said."
"First, they deprive us of revenue. We did not say and the state is not a businessman to be able to say that it should profit from this process.
But today the Cypriot taxpayer cannot be asked every year, consistently every year, to pay a sum of €8 million as a deficit to the guardian's administration. This deficit should therefore be covered by the rational management of estates.
This is a major objective that we want to overcome through the changes we are proposing.
The second is that too many of the beneficiaries ,who currently own estates, feel insecure. They feel insecure because they feel that they may not be given the right, either because of their age, to continue to have under their lease that particular property.
So we are giving the opportunity, through the amendment and specific differentiations, to the right of inheritance on the one hand, as I have said before, but also the right of subletting, so that in this particular way it will gain value and will give these people an incentive to invest in that particular value.
Too many of the Turkish Cypriot properties today are completely unsuitable and are in a very bad condition, because quite simply the tenants do not invest anything, because they feel this very insecurity.
And finally the Custodian, by definition, by law, is the custodian of the management of Turkish Cypriot properties for properties to which Turkish Cypriots have rights. And we are mandated by law to safeguard the rights of the owners called Turkish Cypriots as well.
So, with whatever regulations we have introduced, we believe that we are balancing on exactly this difficult line, in an attempt to serve both the one and the other purpose," he said.
Asked by a journalist whether there have been cases of Turkish Cypriots who have asked for their property back, the Minister replied in the affirmative. "We have very many such cases which Turkish Cypriots are claiming their properties," he said, adding that "this is another aspect that concerns our refugee population to whom T/C properties have been given under management.
But specific criteria have been introduced here by the Republic of Cyprus, the most important of which relates to issues of either claim, and even more so to the issues of the right of Turkish Cypriots to sell their property, which is also a parameter that has recently been on the rise.
Here things are clear. As soon as the necessary checks are made and it is established that the Turkish Cypriot owns Greek Cypriot property in the occupied areas, he is deprived of any right to transfer or sell his property in the free areas. This is a safety valve that has been put in place to ensure that there is at least an equality towards our refugee world. As soon as someone negates his property in the occupied territories, he cannot be given the right to sell for his own benefit his own property that is in the free areas, in the areas controlled by the Republic."
(EFYs)
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