WHAT CHANGE?

TOWER blocks in Girne might be shooting up faster than weeds after a North Cyprus flood and it might have become easier to drive unimpeded into a UK nuclear warhead armoury than go shopping in Girne, but little else here ever really changes, now does it?

Well, I suppose the TRNC authorities have just announced the lifting of traffic restrictions on the Girne/Değirmenlik mountain road, I’ll grant you that, but all will soon be back to normal, never fear. In no time at all, overburdened quarry lorries, with loads comprising half the south face of the Five Finger mountain range, will soon be merrily trundling up and down the road, knocking hell out of its surface once again. As I say, very reassuring. All very normal. (Just a thought: why don’t the government make the quarries pay for the repairs? No? Ah, well.)

The Immovable Property Commission (IPC) might be considering taxing those living on “exchange” land to finance its handouts to Greek Cypriot property claimants (which would unfairly affect the majority of the TRNC’s residents, whatever their origin) but again, what’s really new? Turkey and the IPC have already paid out £270 million to so called “displaced” Greek Cypriots since 2006, so what have “displaced” Turkish Cypriots received from the South since then? Zero. Zilch. Nothing. Again, all perfectly normal.

The IPC and Turkey have proved their good intent in trying to solve property disputes between North and South, but it’s all been very one-sided. Until the Greek Cypriots start compensating Turkish Cypriots, why not shut the IPC down? Now, that would make a change, wouldn’t it?

President Akıncı often envisages change. He banged his head against a brick wall for years, sincerely trying to “reunite” the island and got precisely nowhere, like others before him. Yet nobody seems willing, even now, to say that is all over. Even the Turkish prime minister has recently said: “If there is a necessity for a possible permanent, sustainable solution on the island, there is a necessity for the Greek Cypriots to be prepared for this mentally.” Quite right, too, but when is that “necessity” likely to be? When hell freezes over? So no great change there.

The UN is apparently on “stand by” to assist with renewed efforts to bring about that historically elusive Cyprus settlement, but what’s new? That’s all the UN usually does, isn’t it? They’ve been “standing by” for decades.

President Akıncı, with an air of optimism that defines the kind nature of the man, also recently told us that the “TRNC can actually go beyond mass tourism”. Indeed it can. (Perhaps it already has.) With all the overdevelopment in Girne and more traffic jams than the M25 on a Friday teatime, it’s certainly all “beyond” me.

However, fear not. Elsewhere, other “developments” have occurred. The TRNC Central Bank may have instructed their commercial cousins to refuse UK banknotes with the tiniest nick in them, while Turkish lira notes that appear to have been in more pockets than Charles Dickens’ Artful Dodger are still merrily circulating, but so what?

Just think yourself lucky that you are not one of the hapless people stuck with sterling issued by their bank cash machine — that the same bank can’t accept (are you following this?). Now, even I have to admit this is quite an innovative development, far beyond my comprehension, so perhaps some things do change. But surely not this much?

Then we have the committee of the British Residents Society (BRS), who have rightly been praised for “demanding” action on “stealth mortgages” and calling for the issuing of TRNC title deeds on completion of sale. Well done. The problem is that all this has a distinct air of familiarity about it. Every BRS committee since the year dot has said much the same thing (better luck this time, folks). Let’s hope our new TRNC government, who appear to genuinely want to change things for the better, act on the BRS suggestions (fingers and toes crossed, please).

So, we’ve recently had lots of reported “change” that actually isn’t. There is only one change that matters and it’s happening all around us, unannounced and largely unspoken: all this building and construction. The TRNC will never be the same. Change is genuinely upon us. An entirely different TRNC beckons — it’s just that nobody says so.