By Charlie Charalambous
PRESIDENT Clerides yesterday reshuffled his cabinet in an attempt to improve the government’s rock-bottom popularity rating.Three new ministers and a new government spokesman will be sworn in today following the resignation on Monday of Defence Minister Yiannakis Chrysostomis and government spokesman Costas Serezis.Communications Minister Leontios Ierodiaconou resigned from the 11-man cabinet last month, although he remained in office pending the reshuffle.With two ministers and the spokesman resigning, Clerides was left with no choice but to give his administration an eagerly-anticipated facelift.The President had hoped to delay the reshuffle until November, but frenzied speculation on those expected to be axed prompted Chrysostomis and Serezis to jump before they were pushed.With those two leaving of their own accord, unpopular Health Minister Christos Solomis became the only cabinet member to get the chop yesterday.To lessen the blow Solomis was offered — and accepted — a less high-profile job in government. The nature of this new post was not made public.The cabinet newcomers are: Nicosia Disy deputy and Alpha TV boss Socrates Hasikos, 43, as Defence Minister; Paphos Disy deputy Averoff Neophytou, 38, as Communications Minister; and Apollon football club chairman Frixos Savvides, 47, from Limassol, as Health Minister. United Democrats vice chairman and lawyer, Michalis Papapetrou, 52, is the new government spokesman.They will be sworn in at 8am today and the new cabinet will meet at the Presidential retreat in the Troodos mountains later in the morning.Neophytou, the youngest minister in the cabinet, is the biggest surprise of the new crop; he has only been a deputy for three years.One political observer said yesterday that Hasikos was apparently the third choice as defence minister after both Efstathios Efstathiou of Edek and former government spokesman Christos Stylianides turned down the post.A decision on the ministerial replacements came late in the day after a flurry of activity at the Presidential Palace, where a shortlist of names was thrashed out between Clerides, Foreign Minister Yiannakis Cassoulides, and ruling party Disy boss Nicos Anastassiades.A number of those on the shortlist reportedly declined to join the cabinet because they did not want to represent a government tarnished by allegations of sleaze and incompetence.The government has struggled to muster any kind of public support, especially since Clerides diverted the Russian S-300 missiles to Crete under intense international pressure last December.This led socialist party Edek to leave the government, which has since been made up solely of Disy-backed ministers and one from Disy’s junior coalition partner, the United Democrats.The new appointments reflect the influence of Disy in the government and the reluctance of the opposition to give any credibility to an administration it says is on its last legs.
