By Jean Christou
PRESIDENT Glafcos Clerides and House President Spyros Kyprianou yesterday traded barbs in a row over protocol.
Kyprianou, leader of the centre-right Diko party, a coalition partner in the last Clerides government, is upset that he has been reduced to communicating with the President through written correspondence.
A row erupted between the two men earlier this week, when Kyprianou disagreed with Clerides’ plan to meet party leaders separately to discuss all outstanding issues.
Clerides wants to start a wide-ranging dialogue with party leaders on fiscal reforms, which need to be adopted in line with European Union norms.
He is due to have his first contact today with Alexis Galanos, chairman of the European Democratic Renewal Party.
Kyprianou said a meeting of the National Council should have been held with all the party leaders, particularly in the wake of the government’s cancellation of the Russian S-300 missile deal last December.
The row yesterday saw Clerides issuing a three-page response to Kyprianou, which the House President described as ironic.
Clerides said he had been communicating with Kyprianou as head of the Diko party, and not as President of the House.
“I am sorry to say that his (Clerides’) letter had a dose of irony in it,” Kyprianou said.
“I am sad that as President of the House I’ve been reduced to having to communicate with the President by correspondence only. Everything I wrote as President of the House I signed as President of the House and everything I wrote as President of Diko I signed as President of Diko”.
Kyprianou said the whole situation had reached the stage where he would not continue the correspondence.
In his three-page statement, Clerides calls on political party leaders to accept his invitation to meet separately.
Clerides said the issue Kyprianou was referring to had been discussed during several cabinet meetings and that a new meeting was not required.
“Because discussion on the issue had been carried out, the government’s position is that the essence at this time is whether decisions can be taken on critical strategy issues for the country,” government spokesman Christos Stylianides said yesterday.
“In view of the new millennium and EU harmonisation, these were the President’s intentions. At no time did he want to eclipse ideology or neutralise political differences and approaches. The president believed and still believes the government, before passing certain laws especially in the area of harmonisation, should hear all the opinions of the parties, and after studying them to try to form laws that would be the most widely accepted and consented to.”
After a meeting late yesterday afternoon, Diko said it would after all take part in the dialogue with the government, but would seek clarification on several issues before announcing its final position.
