THE ELECTRICITY Authority (EAC) began work yesterday to reroute electricity from the controversial pylons suspected of causing cancer in the Polemidhia suburb of Limassol.
“We will be taking down the pylons and laying the cables underground. It is a big undertaking which involves tearing up some pavements,” EAC Spokesman Tassos Roussos told the Cyprus Mail.
He added giant pylons left lying in the area had never been erected, because of protests from residents.
Roussos said the cables rerouting the electricity from the pylons would be laid parallel to the construction of the new flyovers that will be built over the Limassol roundabouts during the next three to five years.
Two years ago, residents in the area held a protest, threatening to bulldoze any new pylons that were erected. They claimed 13 people, including several children, had died from leukaemia as a result of the magnetic fields emitted by the pylons.
The EAC responded at the time that it was conforming to all regulations and international standards, arguing that its electric power installations emitted just one tenth of the maximum allowed standard.
Nevertheless, last September, the EAC announced that planning permits had been secured to remove the overhead cables from the residential area and relocate them to an agricultural one.
Two farmers in the area where the cables are to be relocated said this week they had been given £32,000 in compensation to move their livestock to another area.
The EAC plans to move the power cables over the next six months at a cost of £100,000.
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.
