Ceiling collapses at Famagusta school

The ceiling of the canteen at the Canakkale middle school in Famagusta collapsed during the February school holidays, it emerged on Monday.

The ceiling’s collapse is the latest in a series of incidences exposing questionable levels of safety at school buildings across the north.

After the deadly earthquakes which took place in Turkey in February last year, inspections were carried out in buildings across the north, with many buildings being found to be unsafe.

As a result, a number of schools saw lessons held in tents during last spring.

Elsewhere, portacabins were set up on waste ground near schools where buildings had been declared unsafe, with that waste ground then flooding in places such as Yialousa.

As inspections continued throughout the summer, more and more schools were declared unsafe, including the primary school in the village of Pentayia, near Lefka, which was declared unsafe just days before the academic year was due to begin in September.

The latest collapse provoked a fierce reaction from the Cyprus Turkish secondary education teachers’ union (Ktoeos), which said “even without earthquakes taking place, our schools are still collapsing.”

The union also asked where the funds, believed to be around 300 million TL (€9m), raised in special taxation in the north for protection against earthquakes and other natural disasters, had gone.