Nilgun Canver commemorated in naming of new council flats building

Memorial plaque of newly named Nilgun Canver House

In a ceremony with a small invited audience yesterday, former Councillor Nilgun Canver was commemorated in the name of a new block of 80 council flats at the corner of Coburg and Western Roads.

Originally from Adana in Turkey, Nilgun Canver came to Britain as a student in the 1970s. She quickly became politically active. In May 1998, she entered the local elections, winning a seat as a Labour councillor for St Ann’s ward in Harringay, which she represented for 16 consecutive years, before standing down in May 2014.

Canver’s career was derailed when she was found guilty of perverting the course of justice in January 2014. In August 2013, her 23-year-old son had taken her car without her permission and had a crash on Tottenham’s Seven Sisters Road. Although no one else was involved, her son was uninsured at the time.

When Nilgun arrived at the scene of the accident, she was quick to protect her son and to deflect blame from him, she told police that it was her behind the wheel. Although she quickly corrected her story, she was nonetheless charged with perverting the course of justice and was subsequently found guilty in a decision at Highbury Court.

A resident of Mattison Road, Nilgun was a regular sight in the coffee shops of Green Lanes, and a strong-willed champion of her vision of Harringay.

The event yesterday was attended by a number of local politicians who all spoke well of her. For me through, I only began to feel a balanced picture of Nilgun in the warm eulogy offered by her friend Ojai and in conversations with her, and with otter of her friends and Cllr Zena Brabazon after the ribbon-cutting. 

Yesterday outside Nilgun Canver House. From left to right: close friend Ojai (excuse the phonetic spelling). Tom Copley Deputy Mayor of London, Joanna McCartney, London Assembly member for Enfield and Haringey, Bambos Charalambous, MP Southgate and Wood Green, Peray Ahmet, Leader of Haringey Council.