Pafos Live 6 September 2023
Construction professionals are sounding the alarm as third-country workers leave the construction sites where they work, following the events of the previous days in relation to attacks on foreign migrants.
They warn of the risk of tarnishing Cyprus' name abroad due to the stalling of projects, especially those already bought by foreign investors, and call on the Minister of Interior to take political decisions regarding Syrian workers.
The problem, as Stelios Gavriel, president of the Federation of Building Contractors' Associations (OSEOK), told StockWatch, is mainly located in the district of Paphos and then in Limassol, noting that "out of fear foreign workers moved from Paphos to another district, waiting for the scene to clear".
He added that "unfortunately, Syrian workers who are in Cyprus under the subsidiary protection regime and are entitled to work in the construction industry have also been hidden."
Public and private sector projects at risk
Mr. Gavriel sounded the alarm bell, stressing that due to a serious shortage of human resources, projects of the public, private sector and foreign investors are at risk of being grounded.
He argued that "we are facing a serious problem in the execution of projects with a visible risk of tarnishing Cyprus' name on the basis that it will not be able to fulfill its obligations towards foreign investors."
He appealed to the interior minister to allow the estimated 10,000 Syrians seeking political asylum to work in the construction industry and pledged that contractors would put in place such safeguards that no Cypriot or Turkish Cypriot would be jeopardized.
At the same time, Mr. Gabriel assured that all workers in the construction industry will be covered by collective agreements.
He noted that it would have been preferable to have more Syrian workers under subsidiary protection status or recognized refugees, acknowledging however that the problem is political.
"Beyond that, we are also interested in importing human resources from Egypt and Lebanon," he added.
Syrian workers 'double-edged sword'
The president of the Pafos Contractors Association and technical director of a land development company (developers), Andros Nicolaou, speaking to StockWatch, said that "construction sites have been emptied, as workers from third countries are afraid to return to their jobs".
Nicolaou said that the Pafos Contractors Association, in a meeting with the Minister of Interior, suggested that specialties in the construction industry be recorded, in order to reveal beyond any doubt the magnitude of the problem of staff shortage.
"We demand that Syrians who are in Cyprus as political refugees and are not asylum seekers be allowed to work in the construction industry," he said.
He explained that the minister raises the risk of creating a wave of applicants from Syria to Cyprus if asylum seekers are allowed to work and described the issue as a "double-edged sword".
Nicolaou also pointed out the risk that the issue of undeclared or illegal employment will become widespread, as long as the problem of lack of human resources is not resolved.
He also noted that 3,000 Turkish Cypriots are employed in the sector in the district of Nicosia and the free district of Famagusta and partly in the district of Larnaka, underlining that the districts of Pafos and Limassol are the biggest problem of labor shortage in the construction sector.
By Iro Efthymiou
