Cyprus-Forum.com

[MicAtCyp]

I think I droped into this thread rather late, and most of the things I wanted to say have already been told.
Congratulations Alex, I will be waiting for the final results and the completion of your study to scrutinaze upon. My first reaction is that the results seem very encouraging.

heres some points I would like to comment though:

Having said that, it seems that there is acceptance of the idea that compensation should be given for properties where refugees live or properties that have been highly invested, so long as the original owner is given a new home in the same town or village.

I am totally against this notion of "you will get compensation" -"you will be given a new home". Who is going to pay this compensation, who is going to give him a new home? These are similar provisions as per Anan plan and the GCs were not that "foolish" to swallow them. Compensation MUST be paid directly by the one who is getting the property. A new house has to be paid totally out of the pocket of the one who will get the compensation. The only job and obligation of the State is to provide that individual the right and fascilities to buy and build by himself. If we are going to load everything to the State it's like in the end having the GCs compensating themselves, as per Anan Plan.
And I think the Tcs will be pretty much surprised to learn that the price the Gcs will ask for their properties are those currently in RoC which are 3-4 times higher than in the occupied.And this is logical because soon after a solution the prices in the north will also start skyrocketing, so why should anyone let his property go at the currently low price prevailing in the occupied?

In fact, I asked refugees what they would do with their properties if they got them back, about 70% said that they intend to use them personally (as primary residence or holiday home) rather than rent or sell them.

Alex just asking is not enough.People reply emotionally. My wife is a refugee.When I ask her she says she will go back. When I ask her how will you go back, will you quit your job, will you abandon this house and go live in a wreckage, how about the children to what school will they go, how about me, my job etc etc, she says well I don't know but I will return. You know, if I say another word that would end to tears and the usual "you cannot understand how we felt to lose our homes and be thrown out in the streets like gypsies" so I usually shut up, but my understanding is that it is practically impossible either for my wife or her 3 bothers/sisters or even her parents to go back.

I tend however to beleive your finding that 70% would want to either return or use it as as a holiday home is accurate enough. However out of that 70% how many are those who would just use it as holiday home? In my opinion the vast majority.

Politis newspaper has done a poll in the past that states only 16% would like to return under TC administration. You may call Mr Andronicou at Politis giving him the article number 432362 and he will give you the full poll .

Heres a small part I saved:

Se o,ti afora tin epistrofi ton prosfugon polu endiaferon parousiazei o pinakas 5, sto erotima tou opoiou apantoun oloi ekeinoi oi prosfuges pou prin to 1974 katoikousan se perioxes oi opoies me vasi to sxedio Anan tha parameinoun upo T/K dioikisi. Apo tous prosfuges autous mono to 16% tha ithele na epistrepsei stis poleis i ta xoria tous, eno to 72% katigorimatika tonizei oti den tha epestrefe

[erolz]

The settlers might not be economically powerful, but politically, a vote is a vote. They certainly play a major role on who becomes elected in the north and who does not.

Why then is there not MP's in the TC parilament of government that equate numericaly to this 'politcialy equal' group I wonder?

[Kifeas]

The TC community is arguing that a solution of the Cyprus problem should guarantee the political equality of the two communities and the sharing of political power. This is a very difficult concept for us to digest because in reality, it is like asking a business partner to invest 82% of the money into a venture, while the other partner will invest the remaining 18% of the money, but on paper -in the partnership constitution, both of them will have to split the shares equally and thus will have an equal decision making power and profit sharing. Do you know many business people in real life that will accept to do such a kind of partnership?

I feel you analogy is flawed. We are not asking for equal share of the profits. We are happy for the profits to be split accoding to the 'share' of each partner. What we are asking for is an equal say in how the business is run (in some issue not all). That is the basis of partnership. What you are asking for is a sleeping partner - one who invests in a business but agrees to have no say or input into how that business is run. We do not want to be (forced) into being a sleeping partner. We do not want more profit that our share relates to but we do want and equal (partner) say in how it is run. There are businesses where the amount invested is different between the partners and the profits are split unequally yet as far as decsion making goes there is some form of equality. Without that equality in how the company is run you are not a partner just an investor.

If you failed to see the entire picture of my analogy and instead you have chosen to concentrate on the detail, which was the mentioning of profit sharing as well, then I am sorry but I cannot help with another example. Certain arguments are self-evident by themselves and they do not need parallel examples or analogies, in order to be understood.

[Kifeas]

The settlers might not be economically powerful, but politically, a vote is a vote. They certainly play a major role on who becomes elected in the north and who does not.

Why then is there not MP's in the TC parilament of government that equate numericaly to this 'politcialy equal' group I wonder?

That is not a strong argument Erol. It not so much the fact that none or very few are elected. Who know if in the future they do not also wish to be elected, btw? They are not elected because the vast majority of them are uneducated plus that it would have been a negative spot in the outside image of "TRNC," under the circumstances, to have settlers in its parliament.

The issue is that they have a vote and thus they influence the election results, regardless of whether they themselves are elected or not.

[metecyp]

Certain arguments are self-evident by themselves and they do not need parallel examples or analogies, in order to be understood.

Apparently, your argument is self-evident only to yourself because I completely agree with Erol.

[Viewpoint]

erolz have to agree with Kifeas on this one, if we switched the table around would we want to share political equality with any other nationality than GCs no we would not. But in EU if someone is resident in a country for more than 5 years they are eligable for citizenship and voting rights, wont this be the case for settlers???? so those older settlers will be eligable.

[erolz]

That is not a strong argument Erol.

It is not a strong argument that settlers are not poltical powerful in Cyprus today becasue there are not any significant nbumbers of settlers represented in parilament or government today?

If you say do.

[Murtaza]

That is not a strong argument Erol.

It is not a strong argument that settlers are not poltical powerful in Cyprus today becasue there are not any significant nbumbers of settlers represented in parilament or government today?

If you say do.

I think main problem is not if they vote or not.
Main problem is they can live in island or not?
At least for me.

[Kifeas]

Certain arguments are self-evident by themselves and they do not need parallel examples or analogies, in order to be understood.

Apparently, your argument is self-evident only to yourself because I completely agree with Erol.

The argument that I refer to as being self-evident, is the argument whether to have a group of citizens, considerably smaller than another group of citizens of the same country, having an equal voting and decision making power, versus the notion of a pure one-man-one-vote democracy in which every citizen irrespective of individual characteristics is equal to any other citizen, as far as his political input /output is concerned.

Isn't this an argument?
Doesn’t each one of the two aspects of this argument have its logical basis? Isn't it a self-evident argument that doesn't need any other analogies, in order to make it visible and tangible as an argument?

[boulio]

Alex quick question i was reading a few days ago in the politis news that the powers that be(UN,US,GB)concerning the settler issue were divising a plan that would allow the original list of 45,000 settlers to stay and grant a type of resident(work) permit to another 30,000 with no right to vote,have you heard anything similar.