Cyprus-Forum.com

by **Demonax** » Thu Jul 11, 2013 5:37 pm

Paphitis wrote:Demonax,

I have no idea if the accusations are correct or not. To me it sounds quite far fetched but not impossible. Banks giving loans to politicians and elitist families which then don't pay it back as the debts are written off for political favour I would presume. Quite scandalous if true, especially as the Banks required a Bail Out and the savings of good hard working citizens had to be levied for this to occur. In effect, the working and middle classes were funding the loans of of the political elites and the old guard establishment. I wouldn't be pleased at all if true.

The other issue is that even if it is true, you are absolutely correct in saying that all parties are innocent until proven guilty. Yes no problem with that at all!

Unfortunately, when it comes to the establishment and ruling elite political classes, they would never be taken to task. In effect, they are above the law and don't need to answer to the allegations in all likelihood.

I met Vasiliou once. My friend was his Pilot when he was flying from city to city on a Government VIP Jet and according to him, one of the nicest and upstanding politicians along other figures such as Mandela and Bob Hawke. I agree that there is something about him that is quite genuine.

I agree with all you said, Paphitis. I am not defending anyone as I don’t have all the facts and the matter is currently under investigation. I am in no doubt that a culture of cronyism and corruption, in broad terms, was prevalent in Cyprus in the years leading to the failure of the local banking system and its likely that elected politicians were involved.

It should be noted that ex-President Vasiliou, who I have a lot of respect for, has denied any wrong-doing and we have to wait for the findings of the attorney-general on all these matters. If anyone has committed crimes I hope they are held to account.

More fundamentally, it’s important we address the culture of complacency and greed that brought on this mess and put checks in place to stop these things happening in future. We need to make bankers more accountable to their boards, and politicians more accountable to the public whose interests they were elected to serve.

by **Oceanside50** » Fri Jul 12, 2013 3:29 am

I saw the list once, there were many businessmen and Mp's including Vassiliou. The Archbishop has taken the government to task on doing the investigation. There were also reports that bank computer disks were erased or destroyed there after...Nothing much since then...

by **supporttheunderdog** » Fri Jul 12, 2013 8:06 pm

I would not trust any investigation this particular AG is involved with. Look at the incident involving his son..

by **CBBB** » Fri Jul 12, 2013 8:36 pm

Oceanside50 wrote:I saw the list once, there were many businessmen and Mp's including Vassiliou. The Archbishop has taken the government to task on doing the investigation. There were also reports that bank computer disks were erased or destroyed there after...Nothing much since then...

In the case of my mate George Vasiliou, he was a guarantor for his son-in-law. What the bank did was give a discount on the interest (a very common practice), but the loan amount was paid back.

If you are in deep brown stuff with a loan, go and negotiate, the banks would rather get some of it back, than nothing!