POLICE raided a popular Limassol night-spot early yesterday and handed out fines of £20 to people smoking — many of them tourists. They also fined the owner the same amount.
Two weeks ago Health Minister Frixos Savvides warned that smoking would be banned from all public buildings, including banks, restaurants, cafés, bars and nightclubs.
But at the time House Health Committee Chairman, DISY deputy Antonis Karas, agreed that if a nightclub wanted to be classed as a smoking establishment it probably could be, although this was something that had not yet been examined in detail.
But yesterday, Stavros Christophorou, owner of Rosie O’Grady’s, a popular nightclub at the Arsinoe Hotel in Limassol’s tourist strip, found himself forced to pay a £20 fine for allowing smoking on his premises.
“Three policemen from the crime prevention unit entered at around 1.30am,” he told the Sunday Mail. “They started handing out £20 fines to my clients for smoking and told me that I had to pay one as well. I couldn’t believe it.”
Christophorou said he had not been told that the law had been amended to ban smoking in public places.
“Last night was the first I’d heard of this law, but the officers told me it had been passed a month ago,” he said, adding that his club was fully ventilated.
But for Christophorou, the problem lay not with him being fined, but with his customers being targeted.
“They went around giving out £20 fines to tourists which resulted in them getting up to leave,” he said. “Who wants to go on holiday, only to find themselves fined for smoking in a nightclub that is supposed to be smoker-friendly?”
“It’s ridiculous. The government should really examine this law because it will have negative effects on tourism and the image we project abroad. And how are establishments like mine supposed to make money if customers refuse to enter because there is a risk of getting a fine?”
Christophorou said his customers had been very angry, but that most would probably not end up paying because he had told them to throw them away since they were going back home.
The fine is written on a slip of paper and the person has to go to the nearest police station to pay, he said.
Limassol police could not confirm yesterday that the raid on Rosie O’Grady’s had taken place and said that no one at the crime prevention unit was available for comment.
But a Nicosia police spokesman expressed shock at the incident.
“I knew a law had been passed,” he said, “but I had no idea they were going to enforce it. It just doesn’t make sense to fine tourists, and I will have to mention it to someone so that it can be assessed because it isn’t logical.”
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
