Students face threat of demolition following illegal conversion of Green Lanes factory building
SIX Turkish postgraduate students sponsored by their government woke up on Wednesday to find their accommodation about to be demolished.
The students, who are studying at universities such as Imperial College and the London School of Business and Commerce, had been renting a property in Green Lanes, Highbury, which had been illegally converted into bedsits. But the first they knew of it was when a team of enforcement officers turned up with crowbars and started to load their beds and furnishings into the back of a van.
Enser Eksi, who is studying for a PhD in computer engineering at Bedfordshire University, said the property was rented by a charity called the Signs and Faith Foundation, which had spent £25,000 on renovating it.
“We have been selected by the Turkish government to come because of academic ability. We are all postgraduates. We have spent £25,000 as a charity to make it nice and now these guys have come in saying they are from the enforcement department,” he said.
“We moved in last January. I’m not sure what I’m going to do now or where I’m going to go.
“It was a good place to study here, as it was fitted out for that and it was peaceful. We are all research students, there’s no end of year. I might have to stop studying while I find somewhere to live.”
Landlord Attilla Abicioglu, said that he thought he had been given the go-ahead from planning officers for the building.
“I was shocked when planning permission was refused,” he said.
“I was going to appeal but I was persuaded to put in another application, but that was refused as well.
“I’m now working with the council to resolve the issue.”
A spokesman for the council said the landlord had signed an undertaking to remove the bedsits within a month and so the students would not be evicted straight away.
“This has been going on for a long time,” he said.
“It’s an improper use. It’s a factory building which has been turned into bedsits, which are inappropriate. We have a duty to make sure that people use the area for its proper use, which is business.”
Published: 8th July, 2011
by ANDREW JOHNSON