Plans for theology college in Famagusta ruled legal by north court

Plans to build a theology college in Famagusta were on Thursday ruled legal by the Turkish Cypriot supreme court, after having been referred to the judiciary by Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman in November.

The plans had been passed by the Turkish Cypriot legislature, but were suspended following Erhurman’s subsequent decision to raise the question of whether they were compatible with the ‘TRNC’s’ constitution.

However, with the supreme court having given the plans the green light, Erhurman announced on Thursday that he will now sign off on them. The college will be the second of its kind, with the first, the Hala Sultan theology college in the Nicosia suburb of Mia Milia, having opened in 2019.

The proposal had been ratified by the north’s cabinet in October 2023 after being included in that year’s financial protocol between the Republic of Turkey in the north, but had not been brought onto the legislature’s agenda in the intervening two years.

It had garnered protests from teachers’ trade unions, with Cyprus Turkish secondary education teachers’ trade union (Ktoeos) leader Selma Eylem having made reference to the plans during a gathering of teachers outside the Nicosia Turkish high school (LTL) in October.

“They are working to open a new theology college in the Famagusta area. This country does not need theology schools, it needs schools which liberate children’s minds. The goal is social engineering, and they are trying to achieve this through education,” she said.

Meanwhile, Ktoeos secretary-general Tahir Gokcebel said at the same gathering that the planned theology college constitutes “a step taken to ensure that the AKP’s medieval mentality takes root in this country”, AKP being the name given to Turkey’s ruling AK Party by its deriders.

He also took aim at the north’s ‘education minister’ Nazim Cavusoglu, saying that “Cavusoglu’s treason against this society must be argued against”.

“The education minister is taking the piss out of this society. A statement must be made explaining whose minister exactly Cavusoglu is,” he said.

The matter of religion in education has been a hot topic throughout last year in the north, with the ruling coalition having spent the spring attempting to legalise the wearing of headscarves by girls at public schools.

They had initially decreed their legalisation in March, before facing a fierce backlash from teachers, the majority of whom are staunchly secular, and then withdrawing the law and reinstating it the following month.

Turkish Cypriots rejected the law in large numbers, taking to the streets of Nicosia in their thousands on three separate occasions.

Teachers took the matter to court, with the north’s supreme court eventually annulling the law in September last year.