Cyprus: parliamentary elections and fear of political fragmentation
During the European elections of May 26, 2019 in Nicosia (illustrative image).
REUTERS - YIANNIS KOURTOGLOU
Text by: RFI Follow
4 min
Cypriot voters are being called to the polls this Sunday, May 30 to elect their deputies on the Greek side.
A ballot that takes place after the failure of the informal meeting on the reunification of the island held under the aegis of the UN, in Geneva, from April 27 to 29.
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The legislative elections of this Sunday, May 30, in the south of the island, on the Greek side, take place in a context of societal mistrust of power, against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, corruption scandals and failures in the negotiations on the division of the island.
The country has been divided since the 1974 invasion of the northern part by the Turkish army after a coup attempt to reattach the island to Greece.
Since then, the island has been divided into two: to the north, a Turkish Republic recognized only by Ankara, the rest of the territory being populated by Greek Cypriots and belonging to the European Union.
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Fifteen parties present themselves, a record, with the risk of obtaining a very fragmented Parliament, if the four major parties that dominate Cypriot political life lose ground, starting with the Democratic Rally, the conservative party of President Níkos Anastasiádis.
“If these large parties manage to maintain their domination after the ballot, the small parties will perhaps garner a deputy here, a deputy there. But, they will not be able to influence the government
, analyzes Gilles Bertrand, lecturer in political science at the Emile-Durkheim Center of Sciences Po Bordeaux.
If, on the contrary, the decline of the major parties continues and if the two weakest of these major parties, that is to say the Diko party which is a center-right party but which is very nationalist, and the Edek party, which is an officially socialist party but also very nationalist, continue their decline which is nevertheless a strong trend since 1991, it can be done for the benefit of small parties. And there, we find ourselves with a crumbling political scene and an Israeli configuration or indeed, the president is obliged to negotiate with many small parties and give them pledges with effects that can be more or less dangerous. If he gives a lot of pledges to small parties who are in the nationalist bidding, that further removes the prospect of reunification, it risks making the country ungovernable.
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The current configuration does not encourage optimism
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The ballot serves as a test before the presidential elections scheduled for 2023. As Cyprus has a presidential system, it is the Head of State who leads the negotiations.
But the configuration of Parliament, elected on a proportional basis, may also have an impact on future negotiations.
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Depending on which parties come out on top, we still have an idea of the leeway the president must have in order to negotiate or not with the Turkish Cypriots and Turkey,"
explains Gilles Bertrand.
However, the current configuration does not encourage optimism, since on the side of Turkey, even if the Turkish government has made gestures towards Egypt, Europe, etc., because that it no longer has a strong ally in the White House with the departure of Donald Trump, the Turkish government has no real incentive to negotiate on Cyprus, as we saw in Geneva a few years ago. weeks.
Since President Erdogan does not have an absolute majority in Parliament and therefore has to rely on an auxiliary ally, the MHP, and that in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus was elected the leader of the historic nationalist party which is an opponent of reunification.
Anyway, even if there was a strong majority in the Cypriot Parliament in favor of reunification, there is no one there to reach out to them.
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