Former education minister will be ‘guiding light’

The battles former Education Minister Cleri Angelidou gave will be the guiding light for future struggles, President Nicos Anastasiades said on Saturday.

Former minister, MP and educator Angelidou, 89, was laid to rest on Saturday following a funeral service at Phaneromeni church in Nicosia.

In his eulogy, Anastasiades said what defined her as a person and guided her course was the vision of a free and prosperous motherland.

“Starting from the notable participation and incalculable contribution in the most brilliant page of modern Cypriot history, that of the Eoka 55-59 struggle for freedom,” he said.

“Your battles will be the light guiding the steps of our struggles, until we are able, as you had envisioned, to freely walk on every inch of this country.”

Angelidou served as education minister between 1993 and 1997 during the Glafcos Clerides administration.

Before that she was elected to parliament with Disy in 1991.

Angelidou was born in Famagusta in 1932, and studied literature in Athens while between 1956 and 1991 she taught in secondary schools.

She had joined the Eoka struggle while a student and was responsible for all the armed organisation’s women’s groups in Karpasia.

Angelidou was married to educator, lawyer and politician Nicos Angelides and together they had three sons.