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Friday, January 18, 2013
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Papadopoulos steps down as DIKO’s second
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Deputies reject property tax bill MP for AKEL asks why property tax bills always seem to end up in the shredder at the parliament By George Psyllides
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EPUTIES yesterday rejected the cabinet’s new immovable property tax (IPT) rates, opting instead to postpone discussions on the grounds that more time was needed to study the provisions in depth. The government wanted the bill approved before Monday, when eurozone finance ministers are scheduled to discuss the island’s bailout bid. The bill, approved by the cabinet on Wednesday and submitted to parliament earlier yesterday, is in line with a preliminary bailout agreement and in theory it could fetch the government some €120 million in 2013. The government requested the bill to be classified as urgent, meaning parliament would have to discuss and vote on it immediately. However, the government’s request was rejected by majority vote – 31 to 17 with only ruling AKEL voting in favour. There were no abstentions. Main opposition DISY deputy chairman Averof Neophytou stressed that despite the postponement, a clear message must be sent to international lenders that parliament remained committed to approve additional property tax after the necessary time was given to lawmakers to study the bill.
“We do not have all the information before us,” Neophytou said during the lunchtime session. DIKO’s Nicolas Papadopoulos echoed Neophytou in that parliament remained committed to passing a tax bill, adding too that more time was needed to “examine the bill in depth.” EDEK MP Giorgos Varnava felt the need to stress that this should not be interpreted as an attempt to protect privileged groups. AKEL however, accused the opposition of trying to postpone discussion until after the presidential elections mid February, although House President Yiannakis Omirou said efforts would be made to put the issue back on the agenda and call another session before the elections once some discussion had taken place at committee level. Nicos Katsourides, the party’s parliamentary representative accused his colleagues of hypocrisy. “In all the years I have been an MP, whenever an IPT bill came to parliament it ended up being shredded to pieces,” he said, adding that under the provisions it was clear that 78 per cent of all property owners would not be affected by the new tax. Wealthy property owners on the other hand, would be. Addressing his opposition colleagues, Katsourides pointed out that no one had expressed any concerns
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Yusuf bin Alawi bin Abdullah (above) was in Cyprus yesterday - the first Omani foreign minister to visit the island where he met his Cypriot counterpart Erato Kozakou Marcoullis SEE STORY PAGE 6
Australian outlaw Ned Kelly to be laid to rest, 132 years later THE remains of Australia’s most famous outlaw, Ned Kelly, are finally to be laid to rest, 132 years after he was hanged for murder. Kelly’s descendants, who received the bushranger’s remains after they were exhumed from a mass prison grave, have said they will hold a private church memorial service today before the burial in an unmarked grave on Sunday. The homemade armour and helmet Kelly wore during his last violent shootout with police and his reported final words before he was hanged at
Melbourne Gaol on November 11, 1880 - “such is life” - helped make him an iconic figure in Australian history. His family, the Kelly Gang, became a symbol for social tensions between poor Irish settlers and the wealthy establishment at the time, and Kelly himself became a folk hero to many for standing up to the Anglo-Australian ruling class. Kelly’s descendants said the private farewells were in keeping with the outlaw’s requests. “The descendants of the Kelly family wish to give effect to Ned Kelly’s last
wish and that he now be buried in consecrated ground with only his family in attendance in order to ensure a private, respectful and dignified funeral,” the family said in a statement. “The family wish for their privacy to be respected so that they may say farewell to a very much loved member of their family.” Kelly’s life story inspired the novel True History of the Kelly Gang by author Peter Carey, which won the 2001 Booker Prize, and the late actor Heath Ledger played him in a 2003 movie.