Paris Demetriades
Gentrification has come to Cyprus, too. Over the past few years, it has taken hold mainly in the coastal cities, where it has sent rents and home prices soaring. It has also left a growing number of people feeling like strangers and second-class citizens in their own country. You can feel its effects when you go out for the evening and even when you head to the supermarket for the basics.
The Greek word for gentrification has a rather positive ring to it, suggesting refinement. But the term has come to describe something largely negative. People are pushed out, often brutally, from neighborhoods where they have lived for years. In short order, wealthier newcomers from abroad take their place. They arrive for one reason or another, and what follows amounts to an unofficial economic conquest that becomes a cultural one as well. For reasons that are easy enough to understand, the neighborhoods most susceptible to gentrification are often those that have been run down and neglected, where resistance is weak or nonexistent.
But isn’t the bigger picture still troubling? So far, the politicians seem to be fast asleep on the issue...whether you see it as free (market) or as a free-for-all, the state’s absence is deafening.
Are the consequences all bad? Look at what has happened in Limassol over the past few years. No city in Cyprus has felt the effects more keenly, yet I think it’s clear that the breakneck pace of development has benefited many longtime residents, too. Start with property sales and rents. The same forces that have made it hard, if not downright impossible, for many people to make ends meet have been a windfall for property owners, who have seen the value of their holdings more than double in less than a decade. The same logic applies wherever prices have shot up. From coffee and meals out to entertainment and the weekly shop, some lose and others gain. It depends where you stand…
There have been welcome changes, too. Take the landmark modernist factories between Limassol’s two ports. They stood empty for decades before foreign investment helped restore them and turn them into spaces for culture, events and entertainment. The old Carob Warehouse, an architectural masterpiece, was a gem on the verge of collapse. Today, it’s a striking venue for contemporary cultural events, open to the public. The old SODAP and ETKO wineries and the former Coca-Cola factory, now known as Kolla, also host an impressive number of events week after week.
But isn’t the bigger picture still troubling? That, surely, is the question our public institutions, our society and our politicians ought to be grappling with. So far, the politicians seem to be fast asleep on the issue. With the market left to call the shots, whether you see it as free or as a free-for-all, the state’s absence is deafening. To anyone paying even a little attention, it can reasonably look as though the whole thing is running on autopilot.
Nicosia, which relies heavily on the public sector, has largely held out so far. These changes have played out mostly in the private sector. Even so, gentrification could become the elephant in the room in the capital sooner than we think.
