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No matter how hard we try, the old stains from the days of money laundering and the new stains from the ill-reputed cash-for-citizenship programme will be hard to get rid of, as evidenced by the comments this week by the Commission’s Finance czar, Pierre Moscovici, who included Cyprus among the seven targeted tax havens.
The lack of transparency and the eagerness of government officials to satisfy the whims of lawyers and accountants who have a vested interest in selling Cyprus passports, all in the name of “raising funds for the beleaguered economy”, resulted in the island losing what little reputation it had managed to build up as a business hub.
This is why, combined with a go-slow mentality in the civil service, no one will take Cyprus seriously and no major investments will come to our shores. The endless red tape, the annoying ring that everyone hears in the hope that a civil servant will some day pick up the phone and an attitude of “who cares?” is the reason why the technology park in Pentakomo, for example, has never managed to get off the ground.
The unchallenged tradition of clocking off work at 3pm (best case) in crucial departments such as the Cyprus Tourism Organisation, the Cyprus Investment Promotion Agency and the recently renamed junior ministry for shipping, are prime examples of how foreign associates and potential investors perceive us to be – a joke.
Despite all his good intentions, the talk of a one-stop-shop by the Interior Minister is something that we have heard of from successive Trade Ministers for the past two decades, with little progress.
The only way for all this to improve is to get state officials (ministers, directors general, heads of semi-government agencies) to put aside their political ambitions or obligations and look after the greater good of the nation.
Too much has been invested into the cash-for-citizenship programme, and now, as an act of desperation, all that effort and energy will be re-directed into another black hole, the property and construction sector.
Instead, the government should be turning its attention to the shipping industry, with the hope that its contribution to GDP can rise from the current level to 8.5% and even 10%. Setting up a vibrant community of start-ups seems an unreachable goal, while, as all else has failed, CIPA should embark on ‘head hunting’ to lure a handful of ‘big names’ to relocate their business to Cyprus, something which has not happened because everyone was busy selling passports.
President Anastasiades has had a good five years to convince the public that he remains pro-business, something he still needs to work on, if he starts listening to any other people apart from lawyers and accountants.
We need action and not words. We have had too much of the latter for the past five years.
