Lapta, Esentepe municipality ‘chaos risk’,
LAPTA and Esentepe municipalities could be plunged into “chaos” similar to that seen at Yenierenköy, a union leader has told Cyprus Today.
Yenierenköy acting Mayor Mehmet Kadı and 10 councillors resigned last month after it emerged that over 100 members of staff had not been paid since the summer, and new councillors appointed in their place last week also threatened to quit if the government did not take immediate action to address their problems.
Workers at the council have been on a “go-slow” protest since January, with reports of piles of uncollected rubbish becoming infested with flies and rats.
Mustafa Yalınkaya, head of the Municipality Workers’ Union (BES), warned that similar situations could arise at Lapta and Esentepe because of money the local authorities owe to the government.
Figures show that the two administrations, whose employees are represented by BES, owe a combined total of more than 12 million TL to the state in social security and Provident Fund contributions for their staff. It is not clear whether they are also in tax arrears. Figures issued by the union show the biggest municipality debtors as Lefkoşa, owing the government some 126 million TL, Çatalköy Municipality (13.3 million TL), Lefke (15.2 million TL) and Yeniboğaziçi (11.5 million TL), but Mr Yalınkaya said BES was spotlighting Lapta and Esentepe because they presented the greatest risk of staff non-payment.
He claimed the two councils were “facing difficulties” and that all the money they received in grants from the government was “going entirely on paying off debts”.
“Some workers have not even received a salary for the last five months,” he said.
The claims were scoffed at by Lapta Mayor Fuat Namsoy, however, who accused Mr Yalınkaya of “blowing . . . out of proportion” his authority’s 5.2 million TL social security and 2.5 million TL Provident Fund debts.
“From December 2012 to December 2015, we did not pay the social security and Provident Fund [contributions] for our workers,” he told this paper.
“But we have been paying them since 2016. As for back-payments, we are going to benefit from the amendment Bill [passed by Parliament on Monday] and this will also be sorted.
“So there really is no problem. The debts will be paid off through restructuring as stipulated by the amendment.”
Esentepe Mayor Cemal Erdoğan also sought to play down the BES claims, saying: “Esentepe is continuing on its path of stability.”
He admitted: “There was a fivemonth period of salary non-payment [from September last year] but this [money will paid back] by the end of April.
“We plan to do this by providing water to an additional 1,500 homes, which we have been unable to do up until now. The income from this will enable us to pay off the salary arrears.”
Responding to BES claims that Esentepe owes around 2.7 million TL in social security and 1.7 million TL in Provident Fund payments, Mr Erdoğan said: “This covers the period 2010 to 2014, when we did not make these payments. However, the amendment Bill, when enacted, will give us until 2020 to make such payments, so we will be fine.”