IF READERS of this column have that ‘here we go again’ feeling, please remember that our editorial writers also have to tread the same road time and again, because one of the continuing difficulties in Cyprus is, it seems, endemic. We are talking of enforcement of the law – or rather, the lack of it. Whether the subject is road traffic regulations, environmental infringements or, in this case, animal cruelty, the problem, and the solution, is the same. The penalties for offenders exist but the law is ignored because it is not applied as often and as painfully as it should be.
In a special report this week, The Sunday Mail highlighted the cruel practice of lime-sticking and mist-netting in Cyprus which results in the massacre of millions of migrant birds. Trappers go about their business – which has moved from its traditional rural base into a lucrative industry — apparently unconcerned they will ever be caught or prosecuted. They can make rich pickings from the death of songbirds, despite the fact that trapping wild birds is illegal, as are the lime-sticks and the nets.
In fact, the trappers use a combination of old technology and new — the birds are often lured to their death by audio-taped bird songs — to the extent that some 2.2 million birds die on lime-sticks or caught in mist-nets every year in Cyprus, according to a study by the International Council for Bird Preservation.
Who will stop the trappers? Police or game wardens appear unwilling to clamp down on this cruelty despite the fact that they have the law on their side. And those who would intervene to rescue the birds are understandably reluctant to do so because of threats of violence from the offenders, as a number of letter writers to this newspaper have testified.
Yesterday, on the front page of the Cyprus Mail, came more evidence that animal abuse on the island is as bad as it ever was. The Veterinary Services Department admitted that out of 84 reported cases of animal cruelty between May and August this year just two were being pursued through the courts. Does anyone believe that just two cases were worthy of prosecution? Of course not: we agree with the Cyprus Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (CSPCA) that these figures reflect the government’s apathy and reluctance to prosecute rather than any significant improvement in the way people treat animals.
Vet. Services said that its officers always spoke to the owners after being told about cases of ill-treatment and stressed that a follow-up visit was always made to ensure that if the problem was not rectified the matter would be reported to the police. What good will that do? In a case recently reported to this newspaper, neighbours complained to a local vet that a dog was kept chained inside a metal tank on the roof of a house during summer’s searing temperatures. The dog was rescued by the vet, its owner called the police, the dog was given back and the police assured the vet that they would keep an eye on the situation. Is anybody surprised that the vet later found the dog being kept in the same appalling conditions?
Until the authorities stamp down hard on animal cruelty, enforcing the laws, prosecuting, penalising hard and publicising such cases, the abuse will continue and Cyprus will remain notorious as one of Europe’s killing grounds.
Cautious welcome for market rescue package
PARLIAMENT’S stock market rescue package received a cautious welcome from all quarters yesterday, even if the bourse responded by shedding another 2.7 per cent.
Central Bank Governor Afxentis Afxentiou meanwhile rushed to deny that he had told the House finance committee that the ailing market would sink further before stabilising.
Beleaguered investors – who have watched in horror as the market has halved its value since the turn of the year – said deputies had done the right thing in approving three bills aimed at injecting capital into the bourse. But they also spoke of organising protests to demand more government aid for the market.
Brokers called on investors to “take on board” the revitalising potential of the bills approved by deputies on Thursday night. They also urged the Central Bank to lift restrictions on lending for stock market investment.
Afxentiou said it would be wrong to try to boost the market through a more relaxed lending regime and instead urged investors to take advantage of the low share prices now on offer.
But the Central Bank Governor was far more concerned with refuting what KISOS deputy Doros Theodorou had let slip during Thursday night’s heated plenum debate.
Theodorou stated that Afxentiou had told a closed-doors session of the House finance committee that the market would sink further.
Afxentiou yesterday said he had never said the general price index would drop more. He said that what he had said was that if the Cyprus market had risen at the same rate as in other countries, then it would be at 130 or 140 points today. “I did not say and am not saying that the index today should be at 140 points, on the contrary, I agree with those who say that at least some companies have quite low prices on the market and present good investment opportunities,” Afxentiou said, talking up the bourse.
Late on Thursday, after a government rescue package announced the day before had failed to lift the market, the House of Representatives plenum voted in three long-pending stock market bills.
The first and most controversial bill gives stock market investment companies eight months in which to sink 80 per cent of the capital given them by investors into the bourse. The other two bills allow companies to buy up to 10 per cent of their own shares and force companies coming onto the market to make 30 per cent of their shares available by public offering.
The state market-saving package announced on Wednesday included tax relief for investments in shares and a cabinet probe into allegations of “dirty dealings” on the bourse.
The chairman of the investors association PASEXA, Akis Argirides, yesterday said the measures approved by the House were “correct” but not enough in themselves, as they would not have an immediate impact. He said the Pasexa board would be meeting to decide on a possible protest rally to demand more state support for the bourse.
“We would expect all investors to show up to show what the stock market means…what it means to us all…to show how much we all protest about this situation and how much we insist on correct measures being implemented for the market,” Argirides said.
Stavros Agrotis, the vice-chairman of the union of brokers, called on investors to “correctly understand” what had been passed by deputies. He said the bill allowing companies to buy up 10 per cent of their own shares would provide an opportunity the companies would not pass up and called on investors to follow suit and stop selling off their shares “at any price”. “Investors must take on board this essential point,” Agrotis stated.
He also insisted banks had to make loans more freely available if the market was going to recover.
“We suggest specialised loans to those in a bad financial state due to the market – a type of social measure,” he said.
The idea was shot dead by Central Bank Governor Afxentiou.
“It would be wrong to support the market with loans, I do not want to be an accomplice in the creation of a false bubble,” Afxentiou said.
