Filenews 16 January 2025 - by Eleftheria Paizanou
The Commissioner of Taxation, Sotiris Markides, will have a meeting with the football clubs in the coming days, in an effort to find a solution to free the teams from the debts of millions related to the Tax Department and social insurance, and on the other hand the state to take its share.
As is well known, tax debts reach €35.5 million. and arrears in social insurance contributions are over €10 million.
The meeting with the Commissioner of Taxation will seek to involve all clubs that do not comply with their obligations towards the state as well as a representative of the Cyprus Football Federation (CFA).
A competent source told "F" that during the meeting, the government side will make it clear that it will not proceed with a new plan to settle their debts.
Also, directors and members of the boards of directors of companies will be asked to pay a large amount of their tax debts and the rest to pay in two to three instalments.
That is, from the additional debts of €4.1 million, if they pay almost half, then the government will take it as a gesture of goodwill.
In such an eventuality, and if the clubs respond within the timeframes to be determined, the Tax Department will consider pulling back for some time the indictments involving more than 100 football clubs.
In this way, after paying off the new tax debts they created, then they will be able to rejoin the debt settlement plan, to pay off the remaining tax debts amounting to €31.4 million.
It is worth noting that if they are reintegrated into the scheme, the interest and charges over €10 million that returned to the debts will be set aside.
However, the meeting with the Superintendent is considered crucial as it will clarify a lot, since in case there is no goodwill gesture from the clubs, they may get into adventures in other areas, ie UEFA for example.
Time credit until March for Social Security
At the same time, consultations are underway to settle the clubs' debts to social insurance. Under the law, when there is criminal prosecution there can be no settlement but full repayment of debts.
Meanwhile, yesterday APOEL appeared before the Nicosia District Court for social security debts amounting to €2.3 million for the period 2020-2022. The hearing of the case was postponed to March 4, as consultations between the club and the Social Insurance Services are ongoing to settle the debts. With the postponement, APOEL was given time to settle its debts.
APOEL's lawyer, Panos Panayiotou, requesting the postponement, said that contacts and meetings are taking place with social insurance officials to make arrangements for the payment of debts. He said three of the five cases had been paid. The debts repaid amount to €40,000.
The five indictments include 11 APOEL officials, including the company, while some of the defendants have not been served with the indictments.
APOEL's lawyer raised an issue in court over the statement of the Minister of Labour, Yiannis Panagiotou, according to which there is provision in the legislation for the presumption of innocence.
As he said, due to the presumption of innocence, the public authority cannot make statements before the court has made its decision.
