BEING in holiday mode in the last week, vegetating in front of the box, binge-watching TV series and munching only things with excessive amounts of sugar or salt, after big, unhealthy lunches, I was not really fit enough to write a Coffeeshop. And it was the season of goodwill, which our establishment has never been renowned for.
I decided I could do a round-up of the year, so went I through the Coffeeshops of the last 12 months and found, to my shame, that these were all about Prezniktwo, whose tireless, non-stop, publicity seeking ensured he dominated Kyproulla life in a way that none of his predecessors, apart from Makarios, had done.
He was everywhere, all the time, attending everything from office openings to book launches, from memorial services to every conference held, making speeches to any gathering of more than 20 people and giving his important-sounding opinions about current affairs to media crews waiting for him outside the events he was attending.
Tass news agency, which covers everything the Prez does and says, had on average a minimum of four reports per day about him and he was the main story on the evening television news most nights. The only escape from him was when you were in bed, fast asleep, and this is only because the technology that would allow him to appear in our dreams has not been developed yet. It is something to look forward to in 2025.
KYPROULLA under Prezniktwo is a bit like totalitarian state in which the people are relentlessly bombarded with the words and wisdom of the great leader as well as images of him, interacting with his loving people or other world leaders, with whom he is reportedly on very friendly terms.
The similarities with Makarios’ dictatorial rule are many, even though our man is a more liberal version, a bit more tolerant of criticism and does not have an auxiliary force of armed cops to protect him or gangs of heavies to beat up his critics. This is after all the 21st century when you can crush your enemies through fake accounts on social media, which is much less messy.
His marketing and promotion as a world statesman that we have been subjected to for the last year is straight out of the Makarios delusions of grandeur manual, but Prezniktwo has taken this to another level, also posing as a player in world affairs. He came up with Amalthea humanitarian sea corridor to Gaza, which was extremely well-marketed although it achieved little, and more recently, he came up with a plan for dealing with Syria, after the fall of Assad.
This was all marketed with slogans about Kyproulla’s geopolitical significance, upgraded standing in the region, the important role she has to play in the region, sending messages to Turkey, upgrading her diplomatic footprint and being part of the solution rather than part of the problem – we are not even part of the Cyprob any longer.
IF ANYONE was skeptical about the earth-shattering importance of our Prez’s meetings, there was always Mini Me backing him with statements helping us understand why what he did was momentous, historic, unprecedented and how it would upgrade the role of Kyproulla, not only in the region but in the world.
Even when he called the leader of another country on the phone, Mini Me would issue a statement informing us that the prez had a telephone conversation with so and so, to discuss developments in the region and the initiatives he planned to take to bring peace to the Middle East and help Syria’s transition into a democratic state.
In this regard he is way ahead of his inspiration, Makarios, who was much less media-savvy, and in less than two years has entered the club of world statesman, despite leading an inconsequential, midget country of a million people.
And by accident or design, he has taken the country to the West, cosying up to the Yanks with Kyproulla becoming a strategic ally of the US. This is a marked improvement on Makarios cosying up to the Soviets and playing the big boy of the ridiculous, Kremlin-backed non-aligned movement. And we do not need Mini Me to point out the significance of this presidential achievement.
THE ONLY real challenge posed to the president’s total domination of the public sphere was former auditor-general Odysseas Michaelides, but he was ruthlessly removed from this post from which he was constantly grabbing attention.
Prezniktwo pretended he had nothing to do with the annihilation of the holier than thou Odysseas, leaving the AG Giorgos Savvides to take the responsibility, but only a fool would believe that he did not give his approval to the legal procedure for his sacking for “inappropriate behaviour.”
Odysseas had publicly humiliated him on countless occasions – forcing him to sack advisors, accusing him of rusfeti, demanding he returned money he unlawfully received from the state – and had to go.
The Prez will probably find Odysseas in his path again when seeking re-election in 2028, but for the next three years he is free of him, ensuring there will be no audit office meddling during his rule. And as a bonus, his monopoly of the news would remain unchallenged.
HE MAY have been considered the best auditor-general the Republic had, but Odysseas has not been doing so well in his auditions for politician and prospective presidential candidate, as his embarrassing response to something said by Comrade Stef Stef in an interview with Phil last Sunday revealed.
The comrade was asked whether Akel could have a political cooperation with Odysseas and he answered with a general remark that everyone was welcome to his party as long as they embraced the positions of the ‘Akel Left Social Alliance’ platform. He did not say he would seek any contact with Odysseas or that he was keen to sign him up as the party’s presidential candidate. Anyone could join the Alliance as long as they embraced socialist ideals, was his message.
Odysseas immediately tweeted on X: “The invitation by dear Stefanos in today’s Phileleftheros reminded me of the fact that both my grandfathers were active members of the movement of the Left. Indeed, my maternal grandfather doctor Odysseas Ellinopoullos was a leading figure of the Left and the first elected mayor of Lapithos.”
Apart from there not being an invitation, what was really saying? That because both his grandfathers were leftists, he was eligible to be candidate of the Akel Left Social Alliance? Surely a grand-dad with the name Odysseas Ellinopoullos was much more likely to be an Eoka member.
OUR POOR neglected Cyprob got mention from no lesser person than Pope Francis this year, featuring in the Pontiff’s Christmas message, in which he expressed the hope that the walls of separation come down.
“May the Jubilee be an opportunity to tear down the walls of separation: the ideological walls that so often mark political life and also physical walls, such as the division that has affected the island of Cyprus for 50 years now and has rent its human and social fabric,” he said. He also expressed the hope that “a mutually agreed solution will be found.”
It goes without saying that Mini Me had to put a positive spin on this and to point out the significance of the Pope’s words to the dimwits of Kyproulla. “The recognition of the importance of a peaceful resolution to the Cyprus problem by an international figure like the Pope enhances the international visibility of the issue,” he said.
This international visibility could help our Archbishop realise his dream of repositioning the Cyprob as “an issue of invasion and occupation,” outlined in his own Christmas message.
BACK IN the real world of the Cyprob, it was Ersin Tatar’s turn to announce the date of his meeting with Prezniktwo on Friday and have an immediate denial issued by the deputy government spokesman Yiannis Antoniou. He said it would be on January 20 or 21, while Antoniou said “we have not been informed of such a date.”
Back in August the roles were reversed, with Prezniktwo announcing a meeting with Tatar and the UNSG, only for Tatar to insist that he had not been informed about such a meeting, which was eventually held in October. It is all part of the efforts of the two sides to ensure the physical walls of division the Pope spoke about, are never breached.
REGULARS will be happy to know that I eventually found a turkey, weighing 6.4kg and that it was way too much for a dinner for eight. As punishment, three days later we are still eating turkey for lunch.
I wish you happy new year with enhanced international visibility.
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