On the final day of the debate of the state budget, a group of students gathered outside the House of Representative to protest against the cuts to their financial aid. The protestors, representing students studying both in Cyprus and abroad, disapproved of the government’s decision to cut the 2025 spending on student grants by €2.8 million.
“Today student youth send a loud message that both the legislative and executive authorities listen to,” the head of the University of Cyprus student union was quoted as saying. “Savings in the budget on issues of education – this is how the student grant should be regarded – is contrary to the claim that they consider education an investment,” he added.
The government’s argument was that the full amount allocated for the student grant budget was not used up, so it made sense to reduce it. Representatives of the students claimed, however, that the needs of students had not been reduced, but the criteria for student grants were antiquated and out of line with current conditions. They had the full support of the Akel leader, Stefanos Stefanou, who said that the student grant must be increased and that criteria must be adapted to the new conditions shaped by high prices.
On Thursday, Akel issued a statement in support of the students, reminding that the previous government had cut the expenditure on student grants by €24m, omitting to mention that this was done during economic crisis when the reckless spending of the Demetris Christofias presidency had to be stopped. The party demanded the restoration of the cut from the state expenditure on grants, the readjustment of the criteria to reflect current conditions and an increase in the number of those eligible for help.
More money for university students was not a demand just of Akel. House president and Disy leader, Annita Demetriou, receiving a resolution from the demonstrators, said she would meet them to discuss their problems. On Saturday, Disy issued an announcement saying it also wanted the income criteria for a student grant to be reviewed and that the state should “substantially increase expenditure for students and their families”, who were suffering from the increasing cost of living.
The two biggest parties, regardless of their different ideological orientation, are encouraging the sense of entitlement of youth and the belief, cultivated over the years, that the state exists to fund whoever demands money. It is one thing to assist needy students, based on income criteria, and quite another to demand the expansion of the criteria – so that more students would be eligible – and the increase in the grants because the cost of living has increased.
Many of the students protesting, it should be said, are studying at public universities, free of charge, although the cost of their study to the taxpayer is significant. They also study free of charge in Greece and many European universities, so why should they also be entitled to state support? In Cyprus, the state offers free university education, and students should be grateful for that instead of demanding cash support from the state as well. In the past, Cypriots could only study abroad and many of them worked their way through university, without complaining or seeking state assistance. Why today does the state also have to give pocket money to students, who are being offered a free university education?
Unfortunately, this culture of entitlement reigns supreme in Cyprus, everyone on a quest to take as much as possible from the state, which is viewed as a benevolent donor with inexhaustible funds and a moral obligation to pay up whenever cash is demanded. This culture has not come of the blue but has been cultivated by the transactional nature of political behaviour, also known as vote-buying. Politicians have encouraged people to make unrealistic demands of the state. We have seen civil servants, teachers, the military, government doctors, greedily taking from the state for decades, while making a mockery of the idea of public service. Giving is not on the agenda – it is just take, take, take.
Students are merely following the horrid example set by the grown-ups, living under the illusion that the state has an obligation, not only to take care of them, but also to provide them with a comfortable lifestyle, that they do not have to work for. Needless to say this sense of entitlement does not prepare youth for life in the real world and the marketplace – they cannot all get jobs in public sector.
Speaking to the students outside the House, Stefanou said, “we cannot talk about the future of the country and to clip the wings of the future which is you.” The future of the country cannot depend on people who are taught to believe they have a moral right to scrounge from the state. We still await a Cypriot politician to find the courage to repeat what John F Kennedy told Americans in his inaugural address.
“Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.”
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