Government celebrating an agreement that will hand over huge profits to foreign private capital

Statement of Andreas Fakontis, AKEL C.C. member and MP

AKEL C.C. Press Office, 4th March 2016, Nicosia

The government faithful to its failed neoliberal policies has broken yet another of President Anastasiades’ pre-election pledges and is moving ahead with the privatization of profitable Semi-governmental organizations.

With the regulations that were discussed today at the Parliamentary Communications and Works Committee, the Anastasiades-DISY government is concluding the selling-off of the Semi-governmental Cyprus Ports Authority, a procedure which was completed in record time for Cypriot conditions.

In recent years the Cyprus Ports Authority has proceeded to invest millions in the upgrading of the Limassol Port’s infrastructure, at the same time as it is recording tens of millions of profits annually. In fact, these profits are expected to rise significantly due to the exploitation of hydrocarbons in the Exclusive Economic Zone of the Republic of Cyprus.

The government and ruling forces are today celebrating about an agreement that will hand over huge profits to foreign private capital, while the benefit to the Cypriot economy reaches to merely €8 million per year, indeed at the same time as the strategically important cooperation on infrastructure and state security issues will be left to the discretion of any private interests.

As AKEL we are against the privatizations of the profitable Semi-governmental organizations and urge once again all the political forces of the opposition to unite their voices with ours so that together we shall stop the selling off of public wealth and assets, while simultaneously forming the necessary institutional framework for the further modernization, consolidation and development of these organizations.