THE PURSUIT of consensus is one of the biggest follies that plagued our public life in last 30 years. It worked once, in the aftermath of the Turkish invasion, when the so-called social partners – government, unions and businesses – agreed on a plan of action that would help the recovery of the ailing economy. But once the economy was on a growth path again, consensus became a euphemism for giving in to all but the most outrageously unreasonable demands made by unions, in particular those representing white collar workers.
We have this alleged consensus to thank for our constantly widening budget deficit and the falling surpluses at the once prosperous semi-governmental organisations. But no one is prepared to acknowledge this folly, least of all President Christofias, who is constantly waxing lyrical about the need for consensus and that other elusive objective, unity. Neither exists, nor is it likely to materialise in current circumstances, as the president’s ill-conceived attempt to encourage top state officials to ‘voluntarily’ accept a 10 per cent pay-cut illustrated. His ministers and presidential staffers ‘voluntarily’ agreed to the cut, but permanent secretaries, responded negatively, through their union PASYDY.
He is almost certain to suffer a similar embarrassment when he meets the PASYDY leadership, in order to try and reach an agreement, by consensus of course, on how to cut the public sector costs. The union has already said it would never agree to proposals drafted by the finance ministry such as a wage freeze, a cut in pensions and reduction in lower entry wage scales, and threatened strike action. How Christofias is going to persuade the arrogant and selfish leaders of this union to consent to their pampered members making such sacrifices is anyone’s guess.
The president’s efforts to build political consensus for his economic measures and his handling of the Cyprus problem also proved spectacular failures. In the Wednesday morning meeting of the National Council there was broad disagreement over certain issues agreed by the president at the talks. On the same day in the afternoon, two parties – DISY and EUROKO – declined to attend a meeting called by the finance minister to discuss the government’s package of proposals for the economy; two that chose to attend left immediately after the minister’s briefing.
In the economy meeting, the proposals presented had already been decided by the government and submitted to the European Commission as part of Cyprus’ stability programme. There was nothing to discuss, as these proposals could not be changed and the government was seeking was their endorsement, in order to give the impression there was political consensus. It is the kind of consensus that operates in authoritarian societies – the president takes the decisions and the political parties rubber-stamp them in a show of unity.
Christofias has been employing similar tactics on the peace talks. He agrees things with Talat, without consulting the parties but expects them subsequently to give him full support, in the name of unity. But unity would never have been achieved even if he tried to secure consensus for the positions he took to the negotiating table, because there is no unified objective. EDEK, DIKO, EUROKO, and the Greens are opposed to the type of settlement that could be achieved, so there could never be consensus among them. Any effort to achieve it is futile.
Although it would be wonderful for national unity to be achieved through consensus, the reality is it will never happen and Christofias is wasting his time preaching unity and pursuing consensus in retrospect. He was elected president to take tough decisions that cannot be reached by consensus and will not have the approval of the political parties. Ultimately he is in charge of running the country – not DISY, DIKO, or EDEK – and he needs to take responsibility for the decisions that need to be taken instead of trying to share them out. It is almost impossible to run a democracy on consensus and Christofias should have learnt this by now. Trying to secure consensus for unpopular measures and decisions is a sure-fire method of getting nothing done.
