One of the founding members of Disy, Frixos Koulermos rejected on Saturday claims he pressured or blackmailed leader Annita Demetriou and MP George Pamborides, saying only “politically immoral and malignant people” could read his role that way.

Koulermos, also publisher of the Alithia newspaper, said he had been accused “dozens of times” within the last 24 hours of threatening and slandering the party president and Pamborides.

He called the claims “unworthy of comment” but said he felt obliged to “set out the facts”.

He said he went to the party offices alone after Demetriou invited him, as one of the people who helped build the party and who are anxious about what he called “Trojan horses” causing problems within it.

According to Koulermos, Averof Neophytou, the party’s former leader, arrived later after a separate invitation.

The three then went to Demetriou’s office, where she announced without prior discussion that she intended to withdraw from the race for Disy’s presidential nomination to restore party unity.

She said she would telephone Pamborides and asked the two men to stay and listen, after which Koulermos claimed they then exchanged views and ideas.

He said those who “gave our souls for this party” do not resort to such practices.

Demetriou announced her withdrawal from the race on Thursday. The party will choose its presidential candidate through an internal ballot ahead of the 2028 election in November.

Demetriou insists withdrawal was her decision

Appearing on several television channels on Friday, Demetriou denied she had been pressured, insisting that “it was [her] personal suggestion, seeing the concern of the party members.”

She said her only aim was to maintain party unity so Disy could present its own governance proposal for 2028.

She said she did not know who was behind the “slander”, and that some of what had been said and written exceeded the limits of political confrontation.

Demetriou described Koulermos as “a historical figure”.

In reference to the now infamous dinner held at a fish tavern in Nicosia attended by herself, Neophytou and a well-known newspaper owner, at which it is claimed a deal was reached to support her bid for House speaker and Neophytou’s for the party nomination, she denounced both the substance of the meeting itself as well as claims that such a discussion was “held in secret”.  

Pamborides relays different account of meeting

Pamborides’ offered his own account of Thursday’s meeting at Pindarou, stating that Demetriou had called him to her office early on Thursday to inform him she did not intend to enter the race.

He said he “tried to change her mind and yet she appeared determined”. When he arrived later at party headquarters at 3pm, he said, her meeting with Neophytou was already under way with Koulermos present.

Pamborides said he had publicly offered to withdraw if Neophytou did the same, but such a notion was not raised.

He said Neophytou refused to step aside, and he told the meeting his own candidacy would “go to the very end”.

Pamborides claimed Koulermos advised him as he left to “give up the effort”, and lambasted Neophytou’s conduct in television interviews.

Demetriou said the candidacies of both men “are a given” and that both have “committed to respect the ballot result”.

Other potential candidates emerge

Other names are now in play, for former justice minister Ionas Nikolaou has requested candidacy forms, although it is unclear whether he will run.

MEP Loukas Fourlas has also been approached to run however he has reportedly turned down the offer.

Haris Georgiades, former Disy deputy president who heads the Glafkos Clerides Institute, is reportedly furious with the party’s ongoing civil war and is being urged by party members to intervene.