What happened on the Nicosia-Limassol highway on Sunday was beyond belief. Some 2,000 members of the Movement of United Cypriot Hunters (Kekk) blocked the Limassol-Nicosia highway in both directions for a couple of hours, and the police did nothing. The protesters, some of whom had got barbecue going on the highway, dispersed only after President Nikos Christodoulides had promised their president to meet a five-member delegation of the movement at presidential palace on Monday.

Christodoulides made a point of not meeting the delegation at the presidential palace on Monday morning, assigning the task to the interior minister. He did not want to be seen to be surrendering completely to mob rule. That he agreed to see them did not reflect well on his presidency, but worse, it set a very bad precedent. Any pressure group that wants a presidential audience could follow the hunters’ example. Then again, the president was left with no choice – agreeing to a meeting was the only way to stop the protest and the inconvenience to thousands of drivers.

This humiliation of the state could have been avoided if the police were prepared to act decisively, instead of relying on the hunters acting in a reasonable and responsible way. According to the police, they had been informed about the highway protest from social media and contacted Kekk to find out more. The police command consented to the staging of the highway protest on the understanding it would last a few minutes, but it soon became evident that this was not the plan of the hunters, who had even brought barbecues with them.

Police spokesperson, Kyriaki Lambrianidou, defended the police’s inaction once it became apparent that the hunters would not leave the highway before Christodoulides agreed to meet them.

“We responded correctly at that moment, given what we were facing,” she said. There were 2,000 protestors and 125 officers, “a risk assessment was made, and we took our decision and at the given time we took the measures we had to take.”

This was the spokesperson’s way of saying police decided to do nothing. Police decided against the use of force to clear the road, because they were heavily outnumbered, and the hunters could have turned violent in response.

Perhaps it was the right call under the circumstances, but the protest should never have been permitted in the first place, even if the organisers gave assurances to the police, it would be a peaceful protest lasting a few minutes. Instead, the hunters caused traffic chaos, ruined the Sunday of thousands of people, embarrassed the police and made the president bow to their demand for a meeting.

We hope the police have learned a lesson from this and will never again consent to a ‘peaceful’ protest with the potential of inconveniencing people.