Savvides threatens to prosecute absenters

ABSTENTIONS were at an all-time high in Sunday’s municipal elections, despite Chief Returning Officer Lazaros Savvides’ warnings that there could be prosecutions.
The overall participation percentage was 86 per cent, compared to the previous municipal elections when it stood at 92 per cent.

The names of those who failed to turn up and vote, said Savvides yesterday, were now in the hands of Attorney-general Petros Clerides.

Similar threats had been made during last May’s parliamentary elections, but Clerides later decided not to order punishment for the 17,000 abstainers, aged between 18 and 30, whose names had been handed over to the police. He said it was not possible for the police to investigate 17,000 different cases to determine if residents’ reasons for not turning up were serious enough.

But the Attorney-general added that his decision not to prosecute abstainers did not mean that this would be the case in the future too.

It has been 15 years since an Attorney-general has prosecuted members of the public in Cyprus for not showing up to vote.

Savvides’ threatening remarks were made at around noon on Sunday when the percentage of abstentions was much higher than the end result.

He stressed that “voting is obligatory” and that he had spoken to the Attorney-general, “who will await from my office – after the elections are complete and once we have all the data – to submit all the names of those who didn’t vote so that we can move ahead with an investigation into the reasons behind their abstentions”.

His statement was repeated throughout the day on all television channels.
According to statistics, this year’s abstentions were marginally higher than in 2001’s municipal elections (just over 10 per cent).

Savvides announced on Sunday that 82 per cent of Nicosia residents had voted, compared to 2001’s 88 per cent, 86 per cent of Limassol residents showed up (in 2001 it was 92 per cent), 87 per cent of Famagusta residents voted compared to 2001’s 91 per cent, in Larnaca 84 per cent turned up as opposed to the 90 per cent that did in 2001 and 86 per cent of Paphos residents went to vote compared to the previous elections’ 89 per cent.

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