“Don’t blame the Turkish embargo for drop in registry”
Cypriot shipowners are calling for the establishment of a Chamber of Shipping as soon as possible in order to stop the drop in registrations under the Cyprus flag.
Leading shipowners Charalambos Mylonas and Michalis Ioannides told a maritime conference on Monday that the Turkish embargo on Cyprus-flag ships was not the main reason for the island’s registry losing some 1,000 vessels to other jurisdictions in the past six years.
Even getting Cyprus off the dreaded black list of the Paris Memorandum of Understanding (Paris MoU) did not help, as Cyprus moved to the ‘gray list’ and recently to the ‘white list’ and still the number of ships keeps falling.
Detentions of Cyprus flag ships have dropped dramatically and the Cyprus fleet is no longer regarded as a flag of convenience.
“The Cyprus registry and the Cyprus shipping industry are two different things. They should continue working separately but for the common purpose of improving Cyprus’ shipping ranking from ninth in the world it is today with 1802 ships to the fourth or fifth place it used to be,” Ioannides said in his capacity as Deputy Chairman of the Cyprus Union of Shipowners.
“We need a concerted effort by all parties to proceed with establishment of the Cyprus Chamber of Shipping which should act as an advisor to the government on maritime policy,” he said.
However, CUS Chairman Mylonas was far more critical of the delay in establishing the Chamber, despite the praise he showered the officials at the Department of Merchant Shipping which he considers “one of the best in the world”.
“They are doing a great job, Mr. Minister, but that is not enough,” he told the 80 delegates at the conference that included the Communications and Works Minister Haris Thrassou who is responsible for merchant shipping, as well as the new Commerce and Industry Minister Antonis Michaelides.
“We do not seek jobs as ‘advisor’ or any other titles. We don’t want anything. We just want what’s best for all of us and the maritime industry in general,” Mylonas said.
He said that the Bahamas flag only started in 1995, some 35 years after Cyprus, but today commands the third largest merchant fleet in the world with stringent rules that has ships older than 12 years struck off its register.
“So, what is different between Cyprus and the Bahamas?”
Mylonas said that both are equal members of the IMO, both have adopted the English Companies Law, both have the 1894 Merchant Shipping Act as their foundation, both have shipping inspectors, both have a democracy. What, then, is different?
“It has an active shipowners association that acts as an advisor to the government and may comment on major shipping issues,” he said.
“In the case of Malta, which has the fifth largest fleet in the world, the government’s advisors are the shipowners, most of whom, ironically, are from Greece. You could even say that the Greek shipowners are advising the Maltese government on maritime policy.”
Mylonas said that ever since it joined the Paris MoU “white list” together with Cyprus, Malta has gained a number of ships while Cyprus has lost ships. Ever since it copied the Cyprus Merchant Shipping Law in 1971, Malta has risen in the ranks of largest fleets from 21st to fifth today.
“Another excuse about the drop in Cyprus registrations has been the Turkish embargo. How can this be?” Mylonas asked, explaining that when Turkey imposed the prohibition in 1987, barring all Cyprus-flag vessels from entering its ports, the island’s fleet numbered 1062. By the year 2000 the fleet had doubled to 2100 ships.
“The Turkish embargo is an obstacle but not the reason for our fleet dropping from fifth to tenth,” He added.
Mylonas was also critical of the delays in the government. He told the crowd that included DISY Euro MP Ioannis Kasoulides, Akel deputy Kypros Chrysostomides and EvroKo president Demetris Syllouris that parliament also failed to pass shipping-related legislation, many of which were withdrawn for no apparent reason.
The Cyprus Union of Shipowners and the Cyprus Shipping Council agreed 14 months ago to jointly represent Cyprus at the European Community Shipowners’ Associations (ECSA) under the unified name of Joint Cyprus Shipowners Association, with the CUS providing two delegates and the CSC one.
This means that for the first time, the Cyprus shipping sector and the Cyprus shipowners outside Cyprus will cooperate at a European Union level, and this will become the predecessor of a Chamber of Shipping.
In his address to the conference, Minister Haris Thrassou thanked the shipowners for their trust in the Cyprus flag, saying that the government’s policy in the past ten years had been to harmonise the island’s shipping sector with the norms of the Community and the upgrade of the standards of the Cyprus fleet.
He said that in addition to the Paris MoU white list, the inclusion of the Cyprus flag in the Tokyo MoU ‘white list’ may also attract shipping companies to the Cyprus flag.
Thrassou said that the government has already appointed a representative in Japan in order to promote the Cyprus merchant fleet and promote the maritime sector to the Asian markets.
The Minister said “we must seriously review the feasibility of establishing a Chamber of Shipping which will become the central focus of views, demands and problems of the Cyprus shipping industry and will help further develop Cyprus as a successful maritime centre.”
He revealed that following last November’s briefing by Georgos Gratsos, the president of the Hellenic Chamber of Shipping, on the workings and experiences of the Greek model, “we intend to proceed soon with of a dialogue between all interested parties for the establishment of the Cyprus Chamber of Shipping.”
Representatives of the SEK and PEO trade unions took their turn to praise the Department of Merchant Shipping that often even acts in the interest of all workers on board Cyprus ships. However, though praising the Cyprus Union of Shipowners and the smooth way with which labour agreements are concluded, they both demanded to have some say in the establishment of any Chamber of Shipping in Cyprus.
One of the final and most comprehensive speakers at the conference was Eleftherios Montanios, president of the maritime committee of the Cyprus Bar Association, who submitted a three-page plan on how to improve the Cyprus shipping industry and upgrade the image and quality of the Cyprus flag.
In all his points of argument, he emphasised the need for (and absence of) a Chamber of Shipping, ranging from a way to deal with concerns of the shipowners, rapid and effective conclusion of problems and disputes, the vital upgrade of the infrastructure of the Department of Merchant Shipping and the need for the state maritime services to be more flexible in order to maintain a level of quality for Cyprus ships.
“Noteworthy proposals such as a white paper produced in the early 1990s by three leading personalities from the legal profession, as commissioned by the then Minister of Commerce, Pavlos Savvides, should not have been neglected. Such efforts that aim to modernise our shipping infrastructure can still be recalled and reviewed once again,” Montanios concluded.
