‘Too early’ to name common candidate for independents in election

The four independent presidential candidates will get together again on Wednesday for more talks on forging a possible alliance that might garner enough support to push them into the second round of the February 2023 elections.

It’s understood the powwow among Marios Eliades, Achilleas Demetriades, Christodoulos Protopapas and Constantinos Christofides will take place in Nicosia in the afternoon.

Contacted by the Cyprus Mail, Christofides declined to go into details about Wednesday’s meet, but did say that discussion of a poll would be on the agenda.

During a prior meeting of the four, the idea was floated to carry out a poll gauging the popularity of each of these candidates – a benchmark indicating which man would be the best to front a possible four-way coalition.

Christofides also demurred when asked to assess how the parleys are going: “Too early to say,” he offered.

He likewise declined comment when queried about speculation that the four candidates may coalesce around a fifth – as yet unknown – person.

It has also been suggested that, in order to make a breakthrough, the four independents would additionally need the backing of at least one of the two parties – the Greens and Dipa – which haven’t endorsed anyone to date.

Asked about this, Christofides said that Dipa would in all likelihood end up supporting either Disy’s Averof Neophytou or Diko-backed Nikos Christodoulides.

That was his personal opinion on the matter, he clarified.

The four independents seem to converge on a number of issues -Western-oriented, support an open economy, embrace the values of liberal democracy, want an end to corruption and see the necessity of a federal settlement.

However personal ambitions could act as a spoiler – which is why the four are understood to be seeking a formula on how to join forces.

Christofides confirmed that the four are banking on the large pool of potential votes out there – the segment of the population not aligned with any of the traditional parties, as well as first-time voters.

The gambit would be how to get these people to pay attention and rally around the effort underway by the four independents.

On whether the four have set a deadline for agreeing to cooperate, Christofides said that reasonably within the month of October they should strike a deal – or not.

“There’s no timeline per se for agreeing, but everyone understands that after October it would be too late.”