Everyone in Cyprus was aware of the Pentakomo waste treatment plant scandal, which now threatens to scupper the appointment of Costas Kadis as commissioner for oceans and fisheries. Kadis, who was nominated for the post of commissioner by President Christodoulides, had nothing to do with the decision-making regarding the project, but as environment minister, for five years, until 2023, he turned a blind eye to the burying of the waste in violation of the EU’s Law of Waste and Law of Industrial Emissions.
It will be difficult for Kadis to defend his actions when he is questioned by MEPs, but if his proposed appointment is rejected, he will have the president at the time, Nicos Anastasiades, to thank for his disappointment. The contract had Anastasiades’ full backing, even though it was clear from the start of the facility’s operation that none of the obligations Cyprus undertook to secure a €46 million loan from the EU in 2015 were fulfilled. The facility had to recycle the waste collected and make some of it into fuel which had to be sold.
Politico Europe, in an extensive report published a few days ago, said that an EU report it had seen, claimed that the Cyprus government “knew the waste could not be used to make the right type of fuel before the project started, but signed an agreement with the EU anyway.” The report, cited by Politico, also said that “the state services involved have not complied with the commitments to the European Commission eventually leading to the burial of 60 per cent of the waste.”
This was no secret in Cyprus. Several newspapers, including this one had carried reports about the burial of the waste as well as the failure to find buyers for the fuel which was too moist. Thousands of tons of unsorted household and industrial waste was put in a landfill, which was scandalous, considering we had taken the EU money to treat waste and stop throwing it into landfills, which caused great harm to the environment. And this had gone on, in the knowledge of the Anastasiades government for seven years, without any attempt to address the problem.
An internal investigation was carried out in 2019, although the government chose to blame the contractor and do nothing for another four years. The contractor argued the household waste delivered to Pentakomo was too moist to be turned into fuel and had raised the issue with the government, which had been aware of the problem from the start but chose to do nothing. In December 2023, the Christodoulides government did what its predecessor had refused to do – it terminated the agreement with the contractor and the Water Development Department took over the plant.
The Anastasiades government, in contrast had done absolutely nothing, aware that the terms of the EU funding were being ignored and that EU law to continue and pretending everything was fine. We suspect this was the line of the president, which no minister dared challenge. Kadis could now pay for his failure to take a stand about this scandal and playing along with it as minister of the environment.
