Cyprus is blessed, we are told, with over 320 days of sunshine a year. This encourages the growth of the numerous fruits that are to be found on our little island. Some of these fruits are native to Cyprus, others are not indigenous.
One fruit which is definitely uniquely indigenous to our beautiful, troubled island although nobody can point to its precise origins has recently appeared and is much talked about. This is the fruit of politiki efthini.
What is curious about this fruit is that its definition cannot be found either in print or on the internet. It is not in Pampiniotis nor the Oxford English Dictionary, it is not in Wikipedia and not in any on-line dictionary.
In view of the absence of a definition of this particular fruit I thought that I would try and fill in this void of knowledge for the benefit of all making my own contribution to the world of science and at the same time political science.
The first thing that every fruit of any significance has is, of course a Latin name. The Latin name of the fruit politiki efthini is “terastia arloumpa”. This, to those of you who had not had the benefit of a classical education in not so ancient Greek for what is commonly known as complete bullshit.
I have assigned this Latin name to this particular fruit as politiki efthini has no value whatsoever, it lacks any type of fibre whatsoever (moral or otherwise), it has no vitamins and instead of giving energy it actually saps it. Its energy sapping qualities are in fact so great that it is sapping the energy of our country. Politiki efthini is neither a fruit of the law of tort nor is it a fruit of the criminal law. Politiki efthini does not give rise to a liability to compensate and it does not give rise to criminal.
In so far as I am aware there is not one recorded instance of someone found cultivating this bitter sweet enigma of a fruit being deprived of the right to seek election, or to be made to pay any price whatsoever, political or otherwise.
For politiki efthini to take root it needs the fertile base soil provided by a corrupt political system. This is why politiki eftini is prospering and growing so well in Cyprus. This fruit is however not only land based. Cyprus being an island has devised this rare fruit which may also thrive in water where it displays the remarkable ability to make holes in water (as we say in Cyprus), for this is precisely what a finding or a verdict of politiki efthini is.
So why grow it one may ask?
The simple reason is that the sheep eat it. They may in fact prefer it to money in their bank accounts or in their pension funds. It helps them come to terms with acts of criminal negligence or worse that result in explosions in invisible remote areas of our country that former presidents profess not to know the location of which kill and dismember innocent victims and leave mothers without sons, women without husbands and children without fathers.
If sheep are fed the fruit of politiki efthini they soon stop their bleating and they learn once more to live with the wolves that roam in political parties, parliament and government.
The danger is that this fruit of our poisoned national psyche may be addictive and it may have hallucinogenic qualities that may bend our minds into believing that someone actually wants to so something to make things better.
Don’t be fooled. If a camel is a horse designed by a committee what is a crime investigated by a committee of enquiry?
The Fool on the Hill,
Nicosia,
