MEHMET AZIZ

I first found out about Mehmet Aziz back in 2015 when I read Tabitha Morgan’s excellent book, ‘Sweet and Bitter Island’. Wow, what a revelation. I discovered that Aziz was the man who helped to eradicate malaria in Cyprus after the Second World War.

When I began to conduct my own research, I soon discovered that there was almost nothing written or documented about Mr Aziz and his incredible feats. What’s more, there is no monument, plaque or memorial in Cyprus to honour his achievements. There still isn’t. In 2016, I was invited to give a lecture to the students at the English School in Nicosia. Not surprisingly, not a single student (or teacher for that matter) knew who Mehmet Aziz was. It would appear that he was just another forgotten and unsung Cypriot hero.

It has now been 76 years since Mehmet Aziz started his eradication programme to rid Cyprus of this deadly disease called malaria. Thanks to Tabitha Morgan and a number of my close Turkish Cypriot friends, I have been able to piece together the fragments of his life. If you have missed my original tribute, here is a brief summary of Mehmet Aziz’s life story.

MEHMET AZIZ

Nicknamed ‘the fly man’ by those who knew him, Mehmet Aziz is credited for eradicating the malaria disease in Cyprus during the late 1940s. He was appointed Chief Health Inspector by the British Colonial Government during the 1930s.

Mehmet Aziz was born in the village of Kalo Chorio, Larnaca on the 24th of September in 1893. He was the youngest of six children born to Aziz Hasan and Repke Emir. His siblings were Osman, Ahmet, Mustafali, Hayrettin and Leyli.

Not a lot is known about his parents or siblings. There is some speculation that his ancestors may have migrated to Cyprus from the town of Subaşı in Anatolia over 150 years ago.

After graduating from his village primary school in Kalo Chorio (Vuda), Mehmet Aziz attended Ruştiye (a secondary school of that era) and later the American Academy in Larnaca. In 1907, (aged fourteen) he travelled abroad to America with his older brother Hayrettin apparently to study in Connecticut.

Not much is known about this trip. Apparently, his brother Hayrettin went to America to work on the construction of the Panama Channel. In America, Mehmet Aziz was an industrious teenager. Apparently, he would rise at daybreak to sell American newspapers on the street and then go off to work at the Holmes and Edwards Silver Company in the afternoon before attending classes in the evenings. Somehow, he also found time to learn how to play basketball. He was fast becoming a fluent speaker of Turkish, Greek and English.

In 1912, for some unknown reason, Mehmet and his brother decided to return to Cyprus. Unfortunately, when their ship docked in the port of Alexandria their money and travelling documents were stolen. Stranded in Egypt they eventually found work in a confectionery shop and earned enough money to pay for their passage and fare on another ship. The brothers decided to separate (for unknown reasons). Hayrettin travelled to Turkey while Mehmet returned to Cyprus. I am told that Hayrettin first went to İzmir and then later to İstanbul where he got married and worked as translator for an insurance agency. He had a daughter and a son. I am also told that he passed away in 1968 and is buried in Feriköy Cemetery in Istanbul. Apparently, the words: ‘Cypriot Hayrettin Aziz’ are inscribed on his gravestone.

Life for Mehmet Aziz changed forever after he turned 21 years old. In 1914, a famous English scientist, Sir Ronald Ross, came to Kalo Chorio looking for English-speaking locals to help him investigate the extent of diseases such as malaria on the island.

Sir Ross was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1902 for discovering that the Anopheles mosquito was the cause of malaria. He had spent a month in 1914 travelling around Cyprus measuring the spleen rate of the children infected by malaria to determine the prevalence of the disease. He concluded that the spleen-rate in Cyprus averages 21 per cent, which was quite high for a European country. Ross knew that a warm puddle of still water was the ideal breeding ground for the mosquito larvae carrying the malaria parasite. He implored the British Government to do more to ensure that these breeding areas did not exist in Cyprus.

Aziz jumped at the chance to work alongside Ross and in doing so, he received the education that would launch his career. Ross was said to be ecstatic to work with someone as willing and ambitious as Aziz who was so fluent in English, Turkish and Greek.

In 1916, Mehmet Aziz met and married Hıfsiye. She was the daughter of Hafız Mustafa, a famous tailor from the village of Nisou, in the district of Nicosia.

Mehmet and Hıfsiye had three children: a son Baber, and two daughters Türkan and Kamran. It is thanks to Kamran’s diary that I know something more about her father.

Mehmet Aziz is often credited as the originator of the methodology to eradicate malaria in Cyprus, having studied similar attempts to control the disease in Egypt. After the Second World War, he received government funding to put together a team of experts called the Expert Committee on Malaria. Within three years: 1946, 1947 and 1948, he was able to coordinate the successful eradication of malaria in Cyprus.

Aziz often talked about the dedication and the hard work of his team. It was a difficult and at times, a hazardous job. His team of Cypriot health inspectors included; Ali Tevfik, Stelios M Sotiriu, Zenon Panayi Eliadis, Mihalis Tomazou, Elefthorius Hristofidis and Kostas Yiorgiu Fisher. Also working alongside Aziz was a brilliant Armenian Cypriot named Megerditch Megerditchian employed as a Sanitary Inspector. Mr Megerditchian was regarded by many, as the mastermind behind the solution to the problem. He discovered that by pouring petrol over swamp areas and puddles, a thin layer of petroleum film prevents the Tsetse flies from hatching their eggs near the water thus eradicating their population and helping to stop the malaria epidemic at the time.

Apart from eradicating malaria in Cyprus, Aziz achieved other remarkable feats.

Between 1929 and 1948 he visited villages all over Cyprus to teach health education to the inhabitants. He would set up outdoor classes and displaying posters on typhoid, tuberculosis, echinococcosis, and trachoma.

Aziz was also responsible for all the health inspections, treatment and settlement of the war refugees who arrived on the island between the two world wars. He dealt primarily in treating and stopping the spread of tuberculosis, typhus, echinococcosis and trachoma. He helped to organise ‘awareness’ campaigns in villages in order to improve the health of mothers and babies including the introduction of vaccinations and education to help improve various dietary issues. His program also includes strict quarantine procedures for all visiting boats and vessels to Cyprus. I am told that the quarantine system that Mehmet Aziz developed and introduced is still in use today.

In 1950, Aziz became a professor of Health and Well Being at the Beirut University where he educated students from Bahrain, Bangladesh, Sudan, Egypt and Arabia. He visited alumni in their own country of origin to help them set up appropriate health services like the ones he had set up in Cyprus. During this time he became a consultant to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Aziz returned to Cyprus in 1959. A year later he was appointed to the Cyprus Health Commission when the Cyprus Republic was inaugurated. From 1963 until 1974 he was the Chief Officer for the Cypriot Turkish Health Services Commission.

Aziz was awarded an MBE in 1936 and a CBE in 1946. He also received the British Empire Medallion and the Ross İnstitute Award in recognition of his extraordinary work and achievements as the Chief Health Inspector in Cyprus. He was an Associate Member of the Order of St John, the Red Cross and the Royal Society of Health.

Apart from publishing various articles and booklets regarding the prevention of disease, Aziz was also featured in a number of newspapers around the world including the Times and Daily Telegraph in London and the Communist Workers Chronicle in Moscow. The articles described Mehmet Aziz as the great saviour of Cyprus. BBC broadcasts at the time also told the story of this one man’s crusade to eradicate malaria in Cyprus. In fact, Cyprus was one of first countries in the world to be regarded as malaria-free.

According to the American Medical Association, Aziz was widely honoured for his achievement in Cyprus and called ‘the great liberator.’ One article stated that he was like Saint Patrick for ridding his native land of a pest that was far more insidious than the snakes.

Aziz is was once quoted as saying; “I was brought up in a village where sanitary conditions were very bad. This caused the deaths of many inhabitants including children. Many deaths could have been avoided if the conditions were better. If in the course of my service I have done something for the improvement and welfare of my country, then that is my greatest pleasure.”

Mehmet Aziz died in Nicosia in 1991.

Strangely, none of his children ever married. His son (Baber) worked as a technician at the Veterinary Department in Nicosia for many years and died sometime in the 1980s. His daughter Kamran passed away in March 2017 aged ninety-five and his eldest daughter Türkan passed away in March 2019 at the age of 101.

Aziz’s daughters’ life achievements are also quite extraordinary.

Türkan Aziz was born in 1917. In her early twenties, she went to England to study medicine during the Second World War. When she returned to Cyprus after the war, she successfully worked her way up through the male-dominated medical ranks until she became the Chief Matron of the Nicosia General Hospital. She is also credited for writing a very poignant and personal memoir titled “The death of friendship: which was published in English in 2000.

Kamran Aziz was a trail blazer like her father. She was one of the first female pharmacists in Cyprus. In 1947 she opened her pharmacy, (the Aziz Pharmacy) in Nicosia. Kamran was also the first female composer in Turkish Cypriot society. She graduated from the London School of Music and the American School of Music and went on to make a significant contribution to Turkish Cypriot folk music. Her music career started in the 1950s when she formed the island’s first pop music band called Kamran Aziz and Friends. In fact, she was also one of the first female musicians to play in public and pioneered the playing and teaching of western music, along with her colleague, Jale Derviş. She is credited to have composed over 50 original songs including popular tunes such as ‘Ah, my Cyprus’, ‘What happened to you my Cyprus?’ and ‘Bride is coming’.

Both sisters had lived together in the original Aziz family home on the Green Line in Nicosia.

In 2016, I almost succeeded in gaining an audience with the sisters, but Kamran was quite ill at the time, so our meeting was postponed. I had planned to present them with my portrait of their father.

On behalf of all Cypriots both in Cyprus and abroad, I would like to say ‘thank you’ to Mehmet Aziz for his extraordinary work that has ultimately improved the health of so many people in Cyprus and saved countless lives.

Mehmet Aziz Bey – we salute you.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:

I would like to acknowledge and thank Mr Sermen Erdogan for helping to translate various articles and research papers about Mehmet Aziz written and published by independent researcher Ahmet Cavit An. I would also like to thank Mr Mehmet Barışsever for his wonderful support and for helping me to write a more accurate and authentic tribute to Mr Aziz. Special thanks to researcher Kadir Kaba for providing the two beautiful old photographs of Mehmet Aziz for me to use as reference for my drawings.

If you wish to download a high-resolution copy of my Mehmet Aziz commemorative poster please visit > www.talesofcyprus.com/resources