THE FARCE about the multiple pensions seems set to play and play, with the House finance committee discussing the matter inconclusively every Monday, although deputies are determined to introduce a new regime before the Easter recess.
Multiple state pensions is just a small example of the lawful theft our parasitic ruling class has arranged for its members over the years because the idiot taxpayers, who pick the up the bill for this shameless plundering, have never protested or tried to stop it.
What is being discussed at the House finance committee is just a small part of the problem. It affects some 98 officials, 70 of whom are paid more than one state pension. The remaining 28 that include the prez and his finance minister, are paid at least one pension while also collecting a salary from the state which employs them in some position.
Our deputies decided to take a principled stand on this relatively trivial matter, while ignoring their own privileges. They collect a full state pension at 60, unlike the ordinary mortals who need to reach 65 or take a discounted pension at 63.
Should we also mention that after 10 years of what is part-time work, they are paid as much as a public employee gets after 30 years of full-time work? But the injustice is the multiple pensions.

THE GOVERNMENT, meanwhile, tabled a bill that would scrap the pensions for state officials, such as ministers and commissioners, and replace it by a hefty farewell bonus when they left office. According to reports this would have been about €300,000 for someone who served as minister for five years.
What was the logic? In order to end the scam of the multiple pensions the government came up with another way of thieving the taxpayer. A minister would be paid a king’s ransom on leaving office, despite being paid a respectable salary and enjoying an enviable amount of benefits. Is there any private business which pays an employee another four or five years’ worth of salaries at the end of their contract?
The government proposed to pay officials a lump sum of a few hundred grand so they would not get a pension and presented this as a fairer arrangement. A fair arrangement would be for them to get nothing, because they were being paid a good salary for their work. Working as a state official should be seen as a civic duty and not as way to get rich.
Those who become officials to get rich could do this on their own initiative, by taking bribes for favours, instead of becoming dependents of the state.

THIS LUNATIC proposal was rejected by the parties which have prepared six new proposals that would supposedly phase out the multiple pensions gradually. At some point in the future, a state official will not be able to take more than one state pension, it was claimed.
There have been reservations about the latest bills, with some claiming that these might be unconstitutional. Why do the parties not amend the constitution to end the regime of the multiple pensions for good? As all the parties agree about the multiple pensions there would be no difficulty getting the two thirds majority needed to amend the constitution.
And while they are at it, they could end the practice of paying someone who leaves the foreign ministry aged 45 a grand a month pension. Who came up with these arrangements, which nobody can abolish because, stopping the thieving by the members of our ruling class would be ruled unconstitutional by judges who also happen to belong to the same class.
It was a judge who ruled that nobody could tamper with a public parasite’s wage because it had the status of ‘private property’.

I ALMOST felt sorry for Prezniktwo after seeing the opinion poll carried out for Sigma which found that 65 per cent of the population said he should not be re-elected and 69 per cent felt the country was going in the wrong direction; and he was less popular than Akel chief Stef-Stef, who is not that popular.
This was probably the reason he arranged a televised news conference broadcast by all five TV stations at the same time last Wednesday. It was no coincidence that only the five TV station bosses were asking the questions, and no newspaper hacks were invited. All daily newspapers are very critical of the prez, in contrast to the TV stations, three of which treat him like Iraqi state TV treated Saddam.
The fawning coverage always given to him by the state broadcaster is embarrassing, reminiscent of the way it treated Makarios back in the days of his autocracy. On Wednesday, the top news story on its radio news bulletins was that the prez would give a televised news conference that night. This return to the Makarios years gave a hollow ring to the prez’s assertion, at the end of his TV appearance, that “together, we are changing Cyprus.”

THE PREZ just wants to be loved but does not seem to realise that the over-the-top exposure he pursues is having the opposite effect. I have not conducted a survey, but something tells me that most people are fed up of seeing him on their TV screens every single night, promoting himself, with big words about emblematic policies, historic visits, significant meetings and geostrategic importance.
Not even his announcement about reducing the VAT rate on electricity bills from 19 to 9 per cent appears to have won him the public love and adulation he so craves. It may have reduced the percentage of people who believe he must not be re-elected to 60 per cent, but I doubt saving €20 on a €200 bill would make anyone fall in love with him.

IN THE END he may be unloved because of his well-publicised love of money – the issue of the €1000 state pension he has been receiving since leaving the foreign ministry, aged 45, was brought up during the televised news conference. When asked if he agreed that an official should receive a state salary and a state pension, he initially fudged the answer, but eventually said he did not agree.
None of the hacks felt obliged to ask him the obvious question – if you do not agree, why are you taking a pension? This, in addition to your big salary, allowances, per diem payments when abroad and free housing? But money means so much to him, he is not prepared to give up the pension to boost his popularity.

WHY IS the Prez taking the entire political circus with him to Geneva for the informal, five-party conference on the Cyprob? What purpose would the presence of the party leaders serve, considering there will be not time to have a meeting with them?
It was reported that there would be a national council meeting on Monday before the Prez meets the UNSG or Tatar. Why was this not held in Kyproulla before he left, thus saving the taxpayer some money on hotel accommodation and per diem allowances?
There will be a dinner on Monday evening for the heads of delegations plus a sidekick, hosted by Antonio Guterres and on Tuesday morning he will have separate meetings with each delegation, before seeing them all together between 11.30am and 2.30pm.
Apparently, Preznikone will also be part of the circus, as the advocate of the two-state solution at the national council meeting.

AS FOR THE actual meeting in Geneva, the good news is that if nothing is agreed, our prez told hacks on Wednesday that he does not just have a Plan B, “but a third plan and fourth plan”. As long as Turkey agrees to resume talks from where they were left off in Crans-Montana, there will not be a need for either the second, third or fourth plan.