VICTIMS WE, the Turkish Cypriots, love to play the innocent victims. We love putting the blame on just about everyone, except ourselves, for all our woes. I was not around during the British colonial era and therefore I am unable to provide a first hand testimony of what arguments we used to explain our difficulties back then, but I can have a fair guess. I was around and I do have vivid memories of the 1963-74 era. It was the Greek Cypriots and their leader Makarios who were responsible for all our sufferings in those days. For example, whenever it rained on April 23, our national children’s day (an event that took months of preparations) we held that “…. priest” because, according to the rumour mill, he had created artifical rain through seeding the clouds to demoralise us on this special day. Than came 1974 which was the result of imperialist efforts aimed at dividing and ruling us and nothing to do with the fact that the two communities had been each others’ throats since the declaration of independence, if not before. After 1974 we had the Denktaş era and now it was “that bold …” responsible for just about everything. Come the 1990s and we increasingly started pointing the finger at Turkey as well. These days together with our politicians it is Turkey that is to blame for everything. Take the long gone Cyprus Turkish Airlines (CTA) for example. In yet another totally meaningless and histrionic gesture they have planted saplings at a park in Lefkoşa and called it the CTA Forest. The aim, a facebook post explained yesterday , was to remind us of the price that the Turkish Cypriots were being forced to pay. The price of being subjugated by Turkey, that is. I am no big fan of Turkey these days and it breaks my heart everytime I venture out and feel like a minority in an obscure Anatolian town but that does not mean it affords me the right to ignore our own abysmal failures. No one with a grasp of facts concerning the CTA and a conscience can possibly put the blame on anyone but ourselves for that. It was us who employed almost 1000 employees there, when the job could have been done with less than 100. It was us who repeatedly went to Ankara cap in hand asking for help the save this ill fated company whenever it ran into trouble. Until the very bitter end they always obliged. Once to the tune of 60 million dollars if my memory does not mistake me. At a time when the airlines around the globe were opting for mergers in order to survive, we demanded that we own the whole of the company and parted ways with our strategic partners Turkish Airlines. They urged us not to but we said “Hey we are our own masters from now on”. They said “Your decision.” When all the international airlines, even giants like the British Airlines were closing down their expensive city centre offices we opened branches in places like London’s Pall Mall with great fanfares. When the CTA had lost its monopoly over our skies and other airlines started flying to and from Ercan the company had started haemoreging heavily. Our response: appointment of a retired primary school teacher at the helm of the company. Not because he was any kind of an expert in civil aviation but simply because he had served the party loyally for years and he needed to be awarded for these “selfless” services. And when the losses became so huge that we could not longer keep the company afloat we ran back to Ankara begging for help. They obliged once again. But this time subject to the condition that someone from the Turkish Airlines be put at the helm to carry out life saving measures. As soon as this man attempted to carry out some restructuring and cut the workforce the trade union ran to Mr Eroğlu who was our Prime Minister at the time, gearing up to become our next president. Mr Eroğlu said something like “Over my dead body” , the trade union cried with joy, the guy from the Turkish Airlines resigned the same day and went back home, the Turkish government said “enough”. That was the end of the CTA. And we still insist on playing that tired old “Victims” song.
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 09:32:18 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015