The pre-election scenario has started to take shape and the candidates are already announcing their positions. What characterizes everyone's declarations is their reference to all the problems that the place faces, but also generalities such as “elections are a battle of ideas and values”, or “the enemy of good is the best” and others. Everyone preaches the same thing and the citizen wonders which of the three main candidates to believe. All three were close associates of the President and helped build what they now want to overthrow.
One element on which voters will rely to cast their ballots is the consistency so far, which will guarantee and prejudge the implementation of their promises when in power. But the political prehistory of all three does not guarantee that they will deliver on their promises. Their reasons may be good reports of ideas, but the facts, that is, that they cooperated or supported the PD, do not guarantee that we will believe what they say and that makes them unreliable. Their former state conflicts with their promises.
People are puffed up about the “what” everyone will do when they take power, what they are interested in hearing is “how” they will do it. Nice words, visions and wishes are not enough. The voter wants to hear specific realistic approaches that, when implemented, will pave the way for problem solving.
Our biggest problem is the Cyprus problem, which everyone has degraded and reduced to the absolutely necessary, so that they can maneuver and satisfy everyone. They use such general formulations that everyone agrees, even ELAM! In order to understand the real intentions of each candidate, clear answers must be given to all the issues that are thorns and because of these so far there has been no solution. To this end, clear positions on the following key issues are expected:
(a) The first thing they are expected to clarify is to state without spin whether the C/Cs have the same rights as the C/Cs. If the answer is yes, explain how they perceive the political equality of the two communities. In a ICC, which I assume everyone agrees, in what practical way are the two communities politically equal in decision-making in the central government, given that the E/Ks are numerically in the majority? In other words, do they accept the one positive vote of the Turkish Cypriots? If not, explain how this does not constitute political inequality.
(b) Any candidate should decide whether to follow Turkey's policy of isolating it from the energy of the Eastern Mediterranean, provided that all Western plans include it in the relevant equation. More than ten years have already passed since the discovery of the “Aphrodite” deposit and since then there has been no development. I believe that the problem is neither financial nor technical. We are not going to use a single cubic foot of natural gas with the Cyprus issue unresolved. Will the next President continue the same policy? Does he agree with the position of creating a Fund in which to deposit what we consider to belong to the T/Cs and to collect them after the solution? Why the f.a. does not become the catalyst that will help in an overall settlement?
(c) The issue of sovereign equality is proposed by the Turkish side and is very rightly rejected by us, because it leads to the two states and division. But there is a danger that the Turks will use it to prevent talks, as a result of which the accomplishments are consolidated and as time goes by it becomes more difficult, if not impossible, to overthrow them. How does each candidate intend to break the impasse that works against us?
The Cyprus issue will be resolved if we include it in the framework of the new balances that are being formed. Candidates' answers are awaited.
