Bar Association is justly criticised

I would like to refer to the article “Complaints drown Bar Association”, featured in the July 24 edition of the Sunday Mail.

The remarks by a member of the Disciplinary Board of Advocates and President of the Bar Association, Mr Doros Ioannides, are historically consistent with the evasive modus operandi of the island’s legal clique.

Why has he chosen to be somewhat cagey as to the numbers of lawyers who’ve been disciplined? He’s quoted as saying “many”. Just how “many” is many?

In addition, how “many” Cypriot lawyers have ever been struck off and does he think that the maximum fine of a thousand euros is a sufficient enough deterrent for a wayward lawyer? So many questions, so little information emanating from the black hole of the Bar Association, an organisation which operates more like a medieval trade guild.

As for not expecting to clear the backlog of cases “until September or October”, yet another crude pigs-might-fly example of misinformation – unless Mr. Ioannides means next year.

The cause celebre concerning the nefarious antics of my deceased mother’s lawyer, previously and extensively reported in the Sunday Mail, took over 12 months to be examined. The result? Proven false statements in the affidavits lodged by the lawyer at Paphos court, eliminating me as an executor of her will, making himself sole executor and giving himself total control over her assets, were dismissed by the Disciplinary Board as “common clerical errors”. Justice? Forget it.

 

Gavin Jones,

Commenting via

the Cyprus Mail website

 

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.