In a statement – a manifesto of about five and a half thousand words, the former vice president of the Democratic Party, George Kolokasidis, officially announced his candidacy for the presidential elections of '23.
George Kolokasidis, in the first communication with the society, tries to record his main concerns, but also the dangers that Cyprus is facing today, based on his own positions. In his pre-election presence, Mr. Kolokasidis connects the huge corruption that is observed in the political and social fabric, the political situation, with the collapse of the Cyprus problem. As he notes in his speech last night, “on the one hand we have the occupation and on the other we have the suffocating circle of corruption.”
Scandals and partisanship
Giorgos Kolokasidis, who is officially the second candidate for the presidency after the announced candidacy of Marios Iliadis, records in his speech all the scandals of the last decades, from the stock market, the collapse of the banking system, the closure of Cyprus Airways and Synergas , as well as the scandals of Dromolaxia and SAPA. He makes special reference to the scandal of the golden passports, while on this he notes that the “President of the Republic insists on saying that he has been a victim. “He is right and the rest of Europe is wrong.” At the same time, he stigmatizes his own proposals for cleansing and combating corruption, through the zero tolerance of the institutions that produce it. Mr. Kolokasidis claims that “scandals, all the bad ones, carry the sinful stigma of corruption and partisanship. “In everything there is,” he argued, “the element of arrogance of the party world, which believed it could control everything.” As he notes, “the price of scandals and corruption was paid by the citizens, who unreservedly bear the burden of the irregularities of the sinful system.”
Anti-Federal Front
< p>A thorough reference to last night's announcement of Kolokasidis to claim the presidency is made in the Cyprus issue, where he reiterates his well-known and firm positions for a change of strategy, in relation to the desired solution of a Bi-zonal Bicommunal Federation. He cites a number of reasons why, as he argues, the federation's solution in Cyprus can not work, essentially shaping his upcoming election campaign, in an effort to change the base and the talks and the solution. It is clear that, with his well-known and repeated positions on the Cyprus issue, the former executive of the Democratic Party, who even being the vice-president of DIKO, during the presidency of Mario Karoyan, expressed his disagreement with a solution for a federation, is attempting the forthcoming to appear as the representative of the third pole. With positions that touch on the central area on the one hand, and in terms of philosophy and practical proposals on various problems, but also with positions on the Cyprus issue, where today it can find allies and even organized factions, such as EDEK and ELAM. . Parties that with official declarations are included and claim space in the anti-federal front.
New data in the Center?
Based on the positions as recorded in the declaration of the presidency, and under certain conditions, the candidacy of George Kolokasidis can form some new data in the area of the so-called central space.
- To be a dynamic candidate of a front against the federation, with the ability to record percentages that will reflect the breadth of this front, which is real and even with stronger tendencies.
- It is difficult the framework of action of a candidate from the field of DIKO and mainly in the possible proposal for candidacy of Nikola Papadopoulos.
- According to information, which can not be disputed, clearly George Kolokasidis has the support of a group of executives in the field of DIKO, whose positions are in line with his own, centered on the Cyprus issue, something that in fact can create rifts in the internal party discussions for the final decisions of the third party in power.
- According to party sources, Kolokasidis' candidacy is a serious and internal pressure on Nikolas Papadopoulos, as a result of which the framework of contacts and aspirations in the negotiations carried out by the president of DIKO, both with DISY and Averof Neophytou, with AKEL. With the information insisting that he put himself on the table, with the big opposition party as a possible candidate, without of course being rejected by another widely accepted personality.
- Whether his presence George Kolokasidis in the election will reduce the role of a potentially independent candidate Nikos Christodoulidis in the center.
Anyway, the announcement and official candidacy of George Kolokasidis is essentially the beginning of a long campaign, with a fluid political landscape that could change the reactions of conventional political forces and their plans for '23.
