Documenting surrender: water privatization and governing dependence in north Cyprus

On September 26th, 2014 then-Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Hamit Bakırcı, declared the de-facto Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC hereafter) state and its offices to be defunct and incapable to manage the water infrastructure. The water in question was/is to be provided by the Turkish Republic, flowing through a water supply pipeline, or the so-called Project of the Century. Funded by the Turkish state, the mega-infrastructure project is an agglomeration of an 80 km undersea pipeline that stretches across the Mediterranean, upgraded network pipes in the north of Cyprus, along with purification plants, dams, treatment facilities, and storage sites. The transferred water was to be provided for the communities of north Cyprus who have been grappling with a water-scarce geography on a daily basis for decades.