YFred wrote:New light at the end of the tunnel of the Cyprus problem. They are just pretending not to negotiate. If Diko is unhappy things must be well.Time for Christofias to confront so called allies
RARELY a day goes by without some high-ranking DIKO official appearing before the television cameras to slam President Christofias for his poor handling of the Cyprus problem and for making unacceptable concessions to the Turkish side during the negotiations. The party objects to rotational presidency and the weighted voting proposed by Christofias; it also considers his approval of 50,000 Turkish settlers staying in Cyprus after a settlement as outrageous.
The attacks are not just unrelenting, they are vicious, presenting the president as someone clueless and unpatriotic who would sell out the Greek Cypriots. At the weekend, DIKO deputy Nicholas Papadopoulos accused Christofias of embracing the ‘long-term’ Turkish positions and of agreeing to discuss ‘criteria’ for the property issue, which meant that not everyone would have their properties returned. The previous week, Papadopoulos also lambasted the government’s economic policies that would eventually put the country under European Commission supervision.
The funny thing is that DIKO is part of the government alliance – it is represented by three ministers in the cabinet – and should be accepting responsibility for government decisions and policy instead of behaving like an opposition party. The other government alliance partner EDEK is not much different from DIKO, although it had recently toned down its criticism of the president. At the weekend, party leader Yiannakis Omirou also had a dig at Christofias about the rotating presidency, the weighted voting and the settlers, announcing he would leave the government if the president did not withdraw these proposals.
Ironically, despite their commitment to high principles as far the Cyprus settlement is concerned, these parties have no qualms about belonging to a government that is making proposals at the talks which make a mockery of their valued principles. Their failure to leave the alliance suggests that they are not willing to lose out in the ongoing distribution of the spoils of power, quite yet. When the spoils are being shared out they are loyal members of the government alliance but this loyalty evaporates when it comes to the talks.
The largest share of blame for this perverse situation belongs to Christofias. Although he described it as ‘lamentable’ and claimed it was undermining our side’s efforts, he has been reluctant to force matters, labouring under the illusion that the hard-liners of DIKO and EDEK could be brought into line. This is not going to happen and he should confront his so-called allies now. He should make it clear to them that the talks for a settlement would continue and that compromises would have to be made to achieve this objective. Parties which disagreed with this policy did not belong in his government.
This would not only underline Christofias’ resolve to find a settlement but it would also expose the political opportunism of his back-stabbing allies.
Copyright © Cyprus Mail 2009
Why is this (yet another astute) journalist from the Cyprus Mail not tackling the essence of the problem. Nicholas Papadopoulos has presented a few facts here, while reading from a letter by Rauf Denktash a few years ago.
Denktash had said, we do not want much, we want a partnership based on equality, recognition of our state and a rotating Presidency.
He was given the partnership by the joint statement at the start of these talks along with the equality of which Cristofias is increasingly moving away from the UN criteria to a numerical criteria. He has given the recognition of the state by accepting that all laws, executive orders and judicial decisions of the "trnc" will be recognised leading into the new federation. AND he has provided the rotating Presidency.
What more is there for him to give? Oh yeah, he's also accepted 50,000 settlers before the negotiations had even began.
I'd hate to think what would be the results if Deko were not in govt today restraining what little they can of this national clearance sale.
