Disy to announce nomination for House Speaker

Ruling Disy will on Friday announce who they will formally nominate for new House president, in what should get the ducks in a row as to who is most likely to land the prestigious parliamentary sinecure.

In remarks on Thursday, Disy boss Averof Neophytou said his party had a “clear position” on the matter.

“First, no bargaining, second, no horse-trading. And let us not conflate deliberations, which are necessary for the good of the country, with wheeling-and-dealing. This belongs in the past.”

He added: “Disy shall have a candidate until the end. No more haggling, no more tradeoffs.”

The comments were read as Disy nominating one of their own MPs for House president. Neofytou himself ran for the position back in 2016, but came up short.

Media speculated that the ruling party might nominate any one of Nicos Tornaritis, Annita Demetriou and Demetris Demetriou. The latter gained the most votes of all Disy candidates in the recent parliamentary elections.

To date, only two nominations are confirmed: Christos Christou of Elam, and Charalambos Theopemptou of the Greens.

Another possibility is Dipa leader Marios Garoyian, who had served as the 10^th President of the House of Representatives from March 2008 to June 2011.

Meantime the potential candidacy of Edek head Marinos Sizopoulos looked like losing steam, as the smaller parties – Dipa, Greens, Elam – indicated they would not back him.

Revelations about financial shenanigans inside Edek on Thursday may have had something to do with the ongoing political gamesmanship.

Diko are said to be considering nominating their own chief, Nicolas Papadopoulos. Reportedly any outside support might come from main opposition Akel.

Akel itself intimated that they would stay away from the horse-trading – perhaps hinting they would nominate one of their own.

In 2016, Akel leader Andros Kyprianou threw in his hat for the position of House president. He was running against Disy’s Neofytou, the Greens’ George Perdikis, and Edek’s Marinos Sizopoulos.

The balance of power allowed none of the four to gather the required votes. In the third and final round of voting, Disy dropped the Neofytou nomination and backed Solidarity’s Demetris Syllouris, who narrowly edged out Kyprianou and Sizopoulos.

Syllouris was forced to resign in October 2020, before his term was up, in the wake of an undercover documentary aired by the al Jazeera network apparently showing him and others offering to help a pretend Chinese businessman with a criminal record secure a Cypriot passport.