Mayor Sotiras: "The proposal for five Municipalities will end in a boomerang"

In an experiment that will result in a boomerang for the service of the citizen, estimates the Mayor Sotiras Georgios Takkas, that the suggestion of the English experts for five geographical Municipalities in Cyprus will end, which is included in the report prepared for the reorganization of Topis.

The British experts in their preliminary report on the Local Government Reform in Cyprus, suggest, among other things, the creation of five Municipalities throughout Cyprus and the creation of ten metropolitan Municipalities throughout Cyprus, one of which will result from the amalgamation of Municipalities by province. and the other by merging all the Communities by province.

As Mr. Takkas stated in KYPE, "the feeling we have received from the whole project was mainly the reduction of the cost of the Local Government, but also its efficiency and productivity". For the operating cost of T.A. "For which there was a great deal of grief", as he said, "is answered by the study itself, where it is stated that the percentage spent for T.A. in Cyprus, is the second lowest in the European Union ".

With this remark, he continued, "it is questionable why we are proceeding with this restructuring project, which will cost some millions and for a while the abolition of the existing model and experimentation with the new proposal and its results."

He added that "based on the low cost, we could improve the bad ones with the right system of internal control, with the right organizational structures, with compliance with the accounting standards for all Municipalities, with the existence of indicators for evaluation of the Municipalities themselves but also for so that Municipalities can compare similar things. In other words, the existing system could perform and be more efficient than it is today with targeted improvements ".

Asked about the issue of clustering, Mr. Takkas said that "the existing system, by clustering services with neighboring Municipalities and Communities, could have the lowest cost percentage in Europe's Gross National Product. "Further reduction in costs could also lead to various improvements such as recycling and better control of water supply."

Mayor Sotiras expressed the fear that "although the proposal of the English experts includes elements with which we agree, their simplified proposal for five geographical Municipalities is an experiment, which will result in a boomerang for the service of the citizen and the creation even a rigid public service away from the citizen and with the disadvantages that we all know ".