OUR DEPUTIES go on a three-month holiday having attended the last session of the House on Friday. The legislature will reconvene after the end of the presidential elections, giving deputies an undeserved rest from their undemanding work.
At least the final session ended with a bang, House speaker Annita Demetriou loudly shouting at deputies, like an incensed headmistress, to restore order and bring unruly deputies into line. I did not think she was capable of losing her temper in public, but she did, infuriating chauvinistic deputies, who cannot handle being shouted at by a woman.
Elam’s leader and presidential candidate Christos Christou, who stands for traditional values, tried to put the uppity woman in her place when she censured him for exceeding the time limit during his speech. He told her that she should respect the party and give it more time as it is “with our vote you are president of the House.”
Demetriou refused to be intimidated, telling Christou “I owe you nothing” and that his words were “offensive.” It was a forceful display by the speaker, who also had run-ins with other male deputies during the chaotic proceedings, showing them all that, despite being woman, she was in charge.
Hopefully, they will recover from the shock by the time they return from their holidays.
THE CHAOS was sparked by debate on a bill for mandatory sex education in schools, which the education minister opposed and had written to Demetriou asking for the vote to be postponed. She responded by telling him he had no business interfering in the affairs of legislature.
Star of the show was Limassol independent deputy Andreas Themistoclous, an unreconstructed male and high priest of political incorrectness, who said that “whichever hand wrote the preamble of the law was guided by a sick mind.” He said we are “living a porn-fuelled and homosexual storm.”
Themistocleous, who said the law was “disgusting, deplorable and sad,” is unlikely to have endeared himself to the LGBT+ community with his nasty homophobia. “We will teach children that it’s ok for two women to kiss each other, and for men the same,” he said before addressing gender change.
“You can’t just grab a child and teach them whatever you want. They’ll teach kids that there are 64 genders, about gender fluidity. So that Kostakis was born a boy and then became Marigoulla.”
Despite Themistocleous’ impassioned plea to the House, the law was passed, only he and Elam voting against it, opening the path for Kostakis to become Marigoulla and for Androulla to become Bambos.
PREZ NIK must have felt like uttering ‘Et tu, Brute,’ after his former Cyprob negotiator and Akel backed presidential candidate Andreas Mavroyiannis turned the allegations of presidential corruption, contained in Makarios Drousiotis’ book Kratos Mafia (Mafia State) into an election issue.
Mavroyiannis said the allegations had to be investigated by the fledgling anti-corruption authority, although he subsequently said, perhaps in order to appease his livid former boss, that he had not filed a complaint. He had just made an observation.
Nik was quite clearly upset by this betrayal, but dressed his hurt in diplomatic language. “If I find fault somewhere, it is that an experienced diplomat, when the president is on an important mission abroad, does not create problems that can diminish the importance of the visit, in the sense of undermining the effort of the president abroad.”
So if Brutus had waited for Nik to return from his important mission to Germany before demanding an investigation of presidential corruption would the Prez have no complaint?
WHENEVER he is faced with allegations of irregular or corrupt practices, Prez Nik orders an investigation that invariably proves he is as pure as the driven snow.
In the past, this task was assigned to the auditor-general Odysseas, who investigated allegations of ties between Nik’s law office and RyanAir, allegations about a big development in the mountains by a client of the same law firm as well claims he was using the private jets of a Saudi businessman who was granted Kyproulla citizenship. In all cases, Odysseas found no suggestion of wrongdoing. He is no Brutus.
To put an end to the latest allegations, rather than ask for an Odysseas whitewash, Prez Nik wrote to the Transparency Commissioner and head of the anti-corruption authority Haris Poyadjis to investigate all the allegations contained in three Drousiotis books. He wants this completed before he leaves office, which might be a tad difficult given the allegations contained, but Nik has no doubt that the truth will shine and, once again, he will be exonerated.
“AT 50, everyone has the face he deserves,” wrote George Orwell, although he never had the chance to find out if his observation applied to him, having died at 46.
I thought about Orwell’s astute observation when dear old Phil, which has been offering detailed coverage of the forthcoming archiepiscopal elections, posted a photo montage of all the holy candidates together, offering the opportunity to compare faces.
If I had any intention to vote in these elections I would choose the man with the kindest most civilized face, as I have no clue what any of them stands for, nor do I care. In the face stakes, there are two front-runners in my not so humble opinion.
The bishop of Konstantias and Ammochostos Vassilios, who has a distinguished, but at the same time benevolent, face, also has another advantage in that he is in his seventies and is unlikely to stay on the throne for 30 years. The other is the blue-eyed Bishop of Tamassos Isaias, whose sympathetic, boyish face would make him a favourite; his disadvantage is that he is only 51.
As for the other four, their creepy looks might help them in an audition for the film role of Rasputin but should disqualify them for the role of archbishop, according to my superficial criterion.
UNFORTUNATELY, the looks criterion appears to be playing no part in the preferences of the people that will be voting for archbishop. According to opinion polls, the perennially-miserable, stern-faced bishop of Limassol Athanasios is way ahead and would be a dead cert to win if the election it was decided by the public vote.
This phenomenon is in stark contrast with the presidential elections, in which the front-runner is the candidate whose advantage over the rest of the field are his looks. His popularity cannot be attributed to his intellect and oratorical skills, which are pretty average, nor to the courage of his convictions, which is non-existent.
Athanasios does have one thing in common with Christodoulides, however, a talent for making utter nonsense believable to a sizeable section of the population. Before the campaign had even begun, Athanasisos said “I do not wish to be elected, but if the Church entrusts me with such a ministry, I will accept it.”
Surely, if he sincerely did not wish to be elected, he would not have submitted his candidacy. He may even have stopped his army of zealots manically campaigning for his election. It is the type of BS you’d expect from someone whose face has never been tarnished with the hint of a smile.
SPEAKING of BS, nobody does it better than Christodoulides, even though he has not reached 50 so he has yet to acquire the face he deserves. His eventual response to a Politis article last Sunday about a Diko memo with the conditions it had set for backing his candidacy was a classic of the genre.
His campaign team had instructions not to comment on the piece, even though Diko immediately claimed it was forged. Christodoulides spoke on Mega 24 hours later saying no such document existed and denying there was any agreement with Diko or anyone else for their backing. Then came the BS assertion that the only agreement he made was with the Cypriot people, through his election programme.
“I will not get involved in this type of discussion,” he declared and then became involved, by saying the report about the secret agreement was an attempt to show Disy members who supported his candidacy that he belonged to another political grouping. He did not, he still belonged to Disy, and would include Disy members in his government if elected.
The Diko-Edek-Dipa candidate that belongs to Disy but is an independent candidate who will stand against the candidate of the party he belongs to is part of the post-truth world Christodoulides lives in and will soon take the rest of us to.
THE GUY has not yet been elected but his wife already acts as if she is the first lady. People in the section reserved for official guests in the church for Archbishop Chrys’ funeral were surprised to see Mrs Philippa Karsera-Christodoulidou join them.
Her other half was already there, but she arrived with one of her daughters and took a place among the official guests. As she was not an official guest – no employee of the foreign ministry would qualify as such – she should not have been there. But as a first lady in waiting, she barged into the section and took one of her daughters, just to show everyone that rules do not apply to her.
It can only get worse from February.
