Gürcafer: “The Greatest Danger for Our Country is the Lack of Planning”

A new issue of Construction Magazine published annually by the Turkish Cypriot Contractors’ Association is out. In addition to the works carried out by the Association for one year, the Construction 2017 magazine includes interviews, articles and news about the sector and it also included the important evaluations of the Chairman of CTBCA, CaferGürcafer. Stating that the the biggest problem in the country is being unplanned, warned us that if we do not go straight to a planned life, whether or not there is a solution to Cyprus issue, we will consume and destroy ourselves.

A new issue of Construction 2017 Magazine published annually by the Turkish Cypriot Contractors’ Association is out. Construction 2017 Magazine, which has come to life by April, attracts attention with its rich content. Including the works carried out by the Association for one year and interviews, articles and news about the sector, the Construction 2017 magazine’s General Coordinator is CTBCA Secretary General ErdimOras and its Writing Affairs Coordinator is CTBCA Press and Public Relations Officer FilizSeyis.

In the Construction 2017 magazine prepared by HK Agency, the interview of the Chairman of CTBCA CaferGürcafer is widely included.

Making important statements to the construction 2017 Magazine, Gürcafer said that the biggest problem in the country is being unplanned. The Chairman of the Contractor’s Association warned us that if we do not go straight to a planned life, whether or not there is a solution to Cyprus issue, we will consume and destroy ourselves.

Stating that the planned life will solve many problems in the country, Gürcafer also added, “As Contractors’ Association, it is our priority to move to planned life in this period. We will fight for this.” The questions asked to Chairman Gürcafer and his answers are as follows:

“I no longer have any hopes for the solution of the Cyprus issue”

Question: In the interview, we made while preparing the magazine last year, our hopes were high. And you said, ‘The solution is around the corner”. It has been a year. How do you evaluate the developments in Cyprus now?

GÜRCAFER: I don’t have any hopes for the solution. In 2003, with the Annan Plan, hopes for solutions were positively impacting the investment climate. At that time, there was an incredible explosion of investments. Subsequently, in 2007, international court decisions came up. With the Orams case, the insolubility process came to the fore again. This adversely affected the investment climate. There was a very steep descent. We entered a period of recession. After that, there was an activation and this affected the construction sector. In the coming phase, both domestic and foreign buyers differed in their view of buying housing from North Cyprus.

“Although the hopes for a solution have collapsed, it will not affect us economically”

Question: What do you think is the reason for this?

GÜRCAFER: I attribute this to the fact that the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights have not been so effective, that countries are gradually moving away from globalization and that Turkey-EU relations are negatively affected. These issues about whether there is going to be a solution in Cyprus, no longer affect the consumers or the buyers in a negative way. In other words, the conditions of insolubility do not affect the buyer anymore. Remember, the Orams case had a huge impact. However, after the Orams case, the decision of the European Court of Human Rights in relation to the existing user created the perception that the formation of the Commodity Compensation Commission or decisions like Orams have no effect especially on consumers abroad. This is also a factor. Another factor is now that the leaders in Cyprus are beginning to give their signals that they can move away from a federal solution. This, of course, leads to the formation of different perceptions. This is what I am trying to say. If we lose our hopes of solution or the negotiations are ceased, we get the signals that we will not have the same negative effect on North Cyprus economy, unlike the effect of the negative answer given to the Annan Plan in 2003 by one of the parties. There is a negligence.

“The search for solutions will not have a negative impact on the construction sector”

Question: How does this affect the market?

GÜRCAFER:  There is a reduction in demand for the North Cyprus housing market from the European market, but there is an increase in demand for North Cyprus from China, Russia and Arab countries, for example. The belief in finding a solution to the property issue in Cyprus, would not be realized by the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, but by finding a comprehensive solution, has greatly increased worldwide. This, of course, has a serious effect on the increase or decrease in interest. Therefore, in the construction sector, we think that the increase in demand will continue in both cases, even if the negotiations continue or not.

“The confidence in the deeds has increased”

Question: Why?

GÜRCAFER: There are a lot of reasons for this. Similar political problems have begun to multiply in the world. The sanctions power of the world and especially of the United Nations also began to be less effective. As it used to be, economic and political sanctions cannot be applied effectively. So now the situation in Cyprus is being looked at differently. The confidence in the deeds has increased. We no longer have a concern like ‘these were Greek properties’, as it used to be. This will continue to positively affect our construction sector. In the coming phase, the greatest danger for the construction sector and the country is that we are responding to this demand in an unplanned, unscheduled and uncontrolled manner. Because this planlessness will lead to the loss of the attractiveness or value of our country. People who come to our country to buy housing are not just for our high-quality concrete, aluminum or wood materials. People prefer our country for its natural beauty, climate, human-demographic structure and culture. If we are doing these things unplanned, our values are decreasing day by day. For this reason, we have to start a planned life immediately. And I think today we should first prepare development plans on the basis of national physical plans and prepare our parallel socio-economic development plans immediately.  In addition to these, we must lay our agricultural, university, tourism and construction sectors on a planned basis. We have to start a planned life immediately by setting some certain targets. We do not have any more time to lose.

“Our priority should be to move on to a planned life”

Question: So, what should we do? What should be our priority?

GÜRCAFER:  Our priority should be to move on to a planned life. If we do not do this, whether or not there is a solution to Cyprus issue, we will consume and destroy ourselves. Although the university sector has positively triggered the construction sector, we believe that the uncontrolled growth of this sector in the long run will damage the country’s economy. This situation is observed by a large part of the society. The university sector in our country is an important commercial sector. The sensitivities of education have been gone. This reduces the quality of education. Kyrenia, for example, is growing in an uncontrolled manner, and permits are given in Kyrenia to allow new universities to be opened all the time. We ruined Kyrenia. In parallel with the increase in the number of students, the demand for housing is constantly increasing. No Development Plan. There are lots of buildings. By the way, when we look at Kyrenia from above, we can clearly see that we have lost this place. It’s so interesting that, we used to jokingly say ‘one day Kyrenia people will migrate from Kyrenia’ and now today, that day comes and Kyrenia people start migrating from Kyrenia. The original people of Kyrenia started to escape from the inner areas of Kyrenia. The planning I’m talking about actually involves all of this. How long will we continue to do housing or how much we will not? How long will the demand from abroad continue? There are Turkish Cypriots living abroad, are we going to make housing for these people and are we going to apply policies that will enable them to return to their countries? All of these are among the issues we need to discuss within our socioeconomic development plans. But unfortunately, we are not doing this. A large part of our problems we are experiencing today stem from unplanned life. There are a lot of socio-economic problems that are caused by the lack of supremacy of law or the incomplete development plans, lumbering bureaucracy or the fact that foreign investors can arbitrarily make any kinds of investments and social problems caused by these or lack of control in universities or in the construction industry. We ignore them, but there is the unplanned life on the basis of all of them. Planned life will eliminate most of these problems. As Contractors’ Association, it is our priority to move to planned life in this period.

“A reformist political understanding is needed for the country”

Question: Could you provide this on your own?

GÜRCAFER: It is not possible, we cannot provide this.  We have to run together with politics.  We have to work together with executive and legislative.  But unfortunately, we do not see such a sensitivity and priority approach in politics. From past to present of all time powers saying that issue is very important, unfortunately none of them has ever done this. They did not block unplanned life, they could not.

Question: How do you evaluate the course of the country economically?

GÜRCAFER: We always said the same things from past to the present.  This country needs the intervention of a reformist mind. We need reforms. All incoming powers are becoming part of all the problems in the country, and unfortunately we can not go beyond fighting the daily problems that this irregular order created.  Thirty years ago, when you went to the door of the Ministry of the Interior, there were fifty people waiting at the door, today there are one hundred and fifty people. What does this mean?  That is why citizens come there because they can not solve their problems where they need to be solved. So there is an irregularity and a disorder in the system. Should the Minister sitting there be interested in everyday problems or should he be busy much more with works and projects at a macro level? Of course, he needs to look at bigger things but he deals with everyday issues. Because the system requires this, the system works like this.   Even worse, this disordered, irregular order in our country has become ordinary, and it has begun not to be find strange, started to react normally.  The expectation of society has also begun to take shape in this direction. In the coming phase, a team should come out and initiate a serious reform process. I believe that if we clean the inside of our own home, of course the insolvency will be effective but nevertheless we can create a serious economic and social development. Because the effect of the embargoes is no longer the same. We have overcome many things and can accomplish many things. But the irregularity, the mess and the degeneration within us are consuming us every passing day.   We see it as palliative measures that the interventions we will do, we can do, to fix certain things.  That is, as long as the issues are looked at as a whole and no complete solutions are produced, these things can not be improved.   Without looking as a complete and taking complete steps, things to do will be no longer serve a purpose.  If we return to our subject. In the past there was no demand for dwellings there was other problems, now there is demand, which creates different problems. There is a need for a reformist touch that will plan all this and regulate it once again.  This can only be possible through changes in the political sector. Today, the way our country is ruled is now classicized. We are being governed the same way today, how we were governed thirty years ago. But the world has changed.  For instance, Turkey has changed a lot.  Change must begin within politics. Change must begin with the law of political parties. Must begin with those who will enter politics. Being a parliementarian or minister should not be that easy. This will be possible both by legal regulations and by changing the value judgement of the society.   There is no change in legal regulations alone.   One truth is that, society manages politics. And this is the case in democracies.   Therefore, the more valuable a political sector we create, the better our country is managed. The worse we create it, the worse it is managed.

“As long as you infringe the law, move to the system you want, it will be ineffective”

Question: Is there a need to foresee  a system change?

GÜRCAFER: As long as you violate the law, you will not be affected by the system you want.  But I must say that.   The Greek Cypriot Chief Prosecutor was sentenced to three and a half years in prison on the grounds that he had caused the government to lose a case and provided benefits to them, in a comment they had made in the past days. The mayor of Paphos was imprisoned while the Mayor of Larnaca was suspended from duty by the cause of illegality. Don’t we have illegalities, irregularities? I assert that there are more and more times than in Southern Cyprus. But is anyone in jail? Ever happened? So we have no dominance or superiority of law. It is on paper, but not in practice. First of all, it is necessary to assin the superiority of law in the country.   For this, a serious clean hands operation is needed. It is a political movement that will launch it. Pollution comes to an end with law.   When the law becomes prevalent, this pollution begins to be cleared, and the society takes courage and it continues… First of all, it must be started from this point.  My belief, if it starts here, it continues. Do not we have enough law? There is, but see, for example, is there any procedure related to a mayor that has been made so far? The municipalities are told to failed. But no one hold the responsibility. Extreme employment, partisanship, occasionally other reasons, caused municipalities to be failed.  Is anyone hold the responsibility? How many people were sent to prison? None of them… If someone sent in, jailed, the incomer does his job legally. Problems can be overcome by legitimating the law.  What we need is a system that will work on the basis of proper law. And that is the politics institution that will do it…