GREEK Cypriots yesterday delivered a resounding ‘no’ to the policies of incumbent Tassos Papadopoulos, ousting him from the presidential race and sending conservative Ioannis Kasoulides and communist Demetris Christofias to a runoff vote.
THE EUPHORIA and disbelief spread across the faces of DISY supporters after Ioannis Kasoulides’ shock win in the first round of the island’s closest ever presidential elections was last night tremendous.
By 6.45pm, it was clear that Kasoulides had not only gone through to the second round, but was ahead of his left-wing rival AKEL leader Demetris Christofias.
THE ATMOSPHERE in and around DIKO offices yesterday evening was as gloomy as the weather.
As initial indications of the first round’s outcome emerged, a feeling of unease descended on outgoing President Tassos Papadopoulos’ offices.
A FEELING of controlled jubilance rippled through the AKEL Nicosia campaign head offices minutes after the results of the first exit polls were released.
“Whatever happens, it looks like we’re getting through,” one AKEL supporter mused.
SIX OTHER candidates fought yesterday’s election battle, all of whom secured less than one per cent of the vote.
NEARLY one in ten, or 50,000 registered voters, failed to turn out at the polls yesterday and from those who did, nearly three per cent cast spoiled or blank votes.
Voting is compulsory in Cyprus. The number of abstentions was up from the 2003 presidential elections, when it stood at 9.45 per cent and blank and spoiled votes constituted over four per cent of cast ballots.
LARNACA Airport faced mayhem yesterday as a number of flights to and from Greece were cancelled due to bad weather.
Hundreds of passengers who had arrived on the island to vote in yesterday’s elections crowded the departures section of the airport, waiting to return to Athens.
SOME 250 voters did not make it to the polls yesterday after their Cyprus Airways (CY) flight was unable to leave Athens due to bad weather.
A number of other CY flights were delayed due to the snow, but arrived on time for voters to reach polling stations before they closed at 5pm.
IN THE END, the opinion polls did get one thing right – that it would be a very closely fought election.
WHEN he witnessed the deadly conflict unfolding between Greek and Turkish Cypriots in late 1963, novelist Lawrence Durrell noted how unreal the bloodshed seemed against the background of the island’s idyllic beauty.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
