EDEK leader Yiannakis Omirou was yesterday named House Speaker, ending days of media frenzy and allowing parliament to get on with the business of lawmaking.
Omirou, 59, assumed the office after a show of hands from EDEK, DISY, the European Party and rogue DIKO MP Zacharias Koulias, garnering 28 of the 56 votes. His main rival, incumbent Marios Garoyian, head of the DIKO party, lost out having received 27 votes.
The third candidate, Greens deputy George Perdikis, got one vote (his own).
The new House Speaker was returned after three votes, given the first did not give any of the contenders the required 29 votes, while in the second count both Omirou and Garoyian got the same number of votes. Perdikis withdrew his nomination just before the third count, and then abstained from voting – producing the same 28-27 outcome in Omirou’s favour for a third time.
Omirou’s acceptance speech, in which he expressed a “deep sense of responsibility” that comes with the office, was a fairly bland affair.
Their nominee defeated, several sour-faced MPs from AKEL and DIKO sat staring at the void waiting for the formalities to end.
But the drama-seekers were not to be denied, and Koulias duly obliged. At the end of the day, it was his vote that tipped the scales. Three times the Famagusta MP snubbed his party leader Garoyian, instead raising his hand whenever Omirou’s name was called out. The first time Koulias did so provoked some oohs and aahs among the gathered press people in the packed-to-capacity hall.
With the voting over, and before Omirou took his seat at the highest point in the room, Koulias asked acting Speaker, DISY leader Nicos Anastassiades, permission to take the floor in order explain why he voted the way he did.
That immediately drew a reaction from the AKEL bench, objecting that Koulias’ intervention was irregular and should not be allowed.
The apostate DIKO MP, who had already walked over to the podium, waited patiently for about five minutes while the debate dragged on. Finally running out of patience, Koulias yielded the floor, saying: “No one is going to shut my mouth. I will tell everything outside.”
Minutes later, outside the parliament, newsmen swarmed Koulias, who explained the reasons he went against his party’s nomination.
He could not in good conscience vote for Garoyian, Koulias said, because doing so would be to endorse the AKEL-DIKO alliance, which he opposes because of the administration’s concessions in ongoing reunification talks.
“I will not be a guardian of the concessions,” he remarked. He declined to comment when asked what he would do in the event he was stripped of his parliamentary seat.
DIKO cadres wasted no time in voicing outrage over Koulias’ act of mutiny. Within seconds of Koulias’ comments, and on the same spot, DIKO MP Athena Kyriakidou called Koulias’ behaviour “the worst kind of apostasy.”
“He has spat in the face of DIKO voters,” she said.
Angelos Votsis, deputy for Famagusta, echoed the sentiment. Using media exposure, DIKO politicians were already turning the heat on their party leader to have Koulias thrown out of the party.
DIKO’s parliamentary team held an ad hoc meeting immediately after the House vote, and decided to banish Koulias from the DIKO bench.
And during a news conference later in the day, Garoyian announced he would be summoning DIKO’s Executive Bureau to vote on a motion for Koulias to be disbarred from the party on the charge of insubordination. “The party’s pride has been injured,” he said. “This is one of the blackest days in the history of representative democracy.”
Earlier, and in his role as acting Speaker, DISY boss Nicos Anastasiades did his best to lighten the tension with some humour.
Prior to the crucial vote in the House, a roll-call was taken of the MPs who were elected 10 days ago.
When Anastasiades called out the name of AKEL MP Eirini Charalambidou, a former reporter and TV show host with the state broadcaster, Charalambidou responded stating “Present.”
“Indeed you are,” quipped Anastasiades, evidently paying Charalambidou a compliment on her looks.
After the vote, and following the wrangling over whether Koulias should be allowed to speak, Anastasiades called on Omirou to assume his duties, telling him: “Please step up, so you can relieve me of this headache.”
