Paphos Municipality has complained that €120,670 deposited at the Cyprus Co-operative Bank had been illegally seized by the CCB to pay off a loan of the Paphos football team that it had guaranteed. It said it would be lodging a complaint to the bank.
The municipality said the bank had unilaterally taken the sum of €120,670 which had been deposited at its account at the bank in order to pay off the last instalment of a €328,000 loan taken out by the Paphos football team from the Hellenic Co-op Savings Fund in 2012 and which was guaranteed by the municipality.
The municipality said this was illegal and arbitrary since Paphos mayor had written to the bank in July last year noting that the municipal council decision to guarantee the loan was an abuse of authority, since the law stipulates that municipal councils require cabinet approval to take out loans.
It added that the council has no authority to guarantee loans taken out by third parties. The bank should have known that the municipal council’s decision was illegal, it added.
The municipality will lodge a complaint against the bank and will ask police to probe possible criminal action by parties involved in the transaction, it added.
