TC property mismanagement leads to threats and arrest (update)

Serious administrative mistakes were made by the Turkish Cypriot property management service which handed over a home to a non-eligible 46-year-old in Paphos, Chairman of the house refugee committee Nikos Kettiros said on Thursday, after the man was arrested on suspicions of threatening to shoot the director of the service.

Kettiros said that while threats constitute a criminal act, the service had in fact mistakenly made the property available to the 46-year-old man and his family, despite the non -fulfilment of eligibility criteria.

Police on Wednesday night arrested the man after receiving a call from a concerned employee of the Turkish Cypriot property management service in Paphos.

According to the police, the suspect called the service at 11:55am and after introducing himself by name asked to be told who was responsible for cutting the power to the property in Polis Chrysochou, where he lives with his wife and family.

According to the employee, the same person called again a short time later allegedly threatening to “get his shotgun and kill the director of the Turkish Cypriot properties in Nicosia,” whom he held responsible.

Paphos police spokesman, Michalis Nicolaou said the relevant authorities had initially provided information to police that the specific residence had been vacated since 2019 due to the death of its legal occupant and since then had remained closed and unavailable to any beneficiary.

The suspect and his family had allegedly illegally moved into the house and had been living there for the past several days, hence the power cut by the service.

According to Kettiros, however, the service had mismanaged the case, as a grandchild of the previous tenant, eligible for the property with priority, had requested to move in, but the service had instead given the property to the 46-year-old suspect and his family.

Kettiros noted that, as was recently mentioned in a report by the auditor general, in Paphos 45 per cent of Turkish Cypriot properties are in use by refugees or eligible descendants, while 55 per cent are in use by non-refugees and local councils.

Use by local councils is legal under certain exceptional conditions, the chairman said, involving public benefit.

The problems arise, Kettiros said from gaps in legislation which are taken advantage of to make subleasing arrangements.

Instances exist of tenants who were mistakenly given the properties who may not have anywhere else to live, however, there are also instances of profiteering, where tenants sublease the properties for a much higher rate than what they pay for them to the property management authorities.

These transactions have been known about for years and are conducted through “black money” exchanges which were exposed on Wednesday in the auditor general’s special report, Kettiros said.

“Whatever one thinks of the auditor general, one must respect the work he did towards transparency. The first thing we need to secure is transparency,” the chairman insisted, adding that in Wednesday’s meeting the committee had agreed on the first step of making public a list of all available properties as they are allocated.

Transparent management must be instituted despite any pushback from other interests, in order to serve the 94 per cent of refugees with legitimate claims, who have not benefitted from the system, Kettiros concluded.