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What services are we getting for our tax payments
(archive article - Sunday, October 16, 2005)
Dear Sir,
Your editorial article “Helping the tax cheats” (October 6, 2005) raised a question. As you rightly say “…without taxes the state cannot provide the services the citizens have come to expect”. But what are those services?
Highly qualified (Ph.D, post-doctoral studies, numerous scientific publications…), I came to Cyprus in 1972 to proudly serve my country. I was received coldly and with a lot of resentment. As a result, I returned to Europe and the US, where I stayed throughout my career. In 2001 my family and I decided to try living in Cyprus again, but this time financially independent and no longer in need of connections and influential people, or so we thought. I have spent a lot of money to renovate my old house, which is located in an apparently stable and quiet residential neighbourhood. I was hoping to live my retirement years in peace, in my own country. How wrong I was, for a second time!
Like most lawful people I pay income tax (for public purposes), property and other municipal taxes (for services in the city), road taxes (for road construction and maintenance), private medical insurance and all indirect taxes. But what are the services I get in return? Virtually none. In fact, I expect nothing from this country except the basic protection that every citizen is entitled to. But what do I get instead? A rising block of ugly apartments next to my house and all the consequences that go with it, just because of poor or non-existing zoning; re-routed traffic into our little road and high levels of pollution, because of incompetent town planning; constant accumulations of rubbish in front of my house, which I myself have to clean regularly; ditches instead of pavements; no water drainage and thus biannual flooding; a civil service that provides no service; dangerous driving… etc. (the list is endless). My family’s life has become very unpleasant, because everything that has been imposed upon us is beyond our control. To put it simply, I had never suspected that by moving here in the 21st century I was leading my family into the nightmare of a virtually lawless country, where laws are selectively implemented, and self-interest and nepotism govern the country.
So what is the remedy for these “hostile conditions”? Selling the house and returning to Europe, I suppose, a move we are seriously considering. For over 30 years, I had been paying taxes in the US or in Europe and I never thought for a moment that it was unfair. Now I do. The state, that is, our “pampered public servants”, should look a little further than simply “finance(ing) their comfortable lifestyle”.
I wonder how many others suffer in silence in this country, often unaware of the possibilities for a better life or because of financial limitations that prevent them from change.
Name and address withheld
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