ELECTIONS tend to come with grand promises, but one lone wolf from Limassol refuses to do that, hoping instead to gather on Sunday the protest vote from all those who feel they have had enough.
“Aren’t you fed up of being part of a party system where you need to know someone to get a job, to win the football championship, to get served by civil servants?” asked independent MP candidate in Limassol, Pambos Stavrou.
Stavrou, 34, is a chartered accountant by trade and this has led him to see politics as a technical problem.
“I’m not targeting specific problems because they all have a common route which is what we should be attacking: the way we do politics is wrong,” Stavrou told the Mail.
There are two ways people vote, Stavrou said.
“They vote for a particular party because their family has been doing so since their grandfather’s time or else they vote because they expect a favour from a politician in return,” Stavrou said adding that everyone knows this but no one says it outright.
“Politicians are not experts or scientists and yet they talk at length about things they know nothing about,” Stavrou said.
This also locks young people within the hierarchy of their party “rendering them unable to do anything about the change they keep talking about.”
But the current political system leaves little wiggle room for passionate individuals.
Voters are forced to choose a particular party and are not allowed to vote for individuals irrespective of their political affiliation.
To make things worse, “the whole system ridicules independent candidacies,” Stavrou said. The political system should instead be about representation, says Stavrou: politicians should cater to the needs and wants of the entire population instead of just on those who voted them in.
“Opinions should not be formed by politicians – we have enough experts and scientists,” said Stavrou not mincing his words.
“Why not ask someone who’s a casino expert what they think should be done about gambling? Why not visit a country which is facing the same problems as us and ask them how they’re dealing with them?”
Stavrou’s point is that a representative of the people should be a “messenger of expert opinion” and work towards “explaining those opinions to the public and in parliament and passing legislation on those terms.”
Instead, “politicians keep trying to reinvent the wheel,” he added. Although Stavrou emphatically does not try to offer promises and proposals he cannot deliver on, he is nevertheless guided by the principles of transparency, independence and long-term vision.
If Stavrou had his way, state mechanisms should be absolutely transparent to its public; independent bodies should be protected at all costs; and planning should span 10, 20 or 30 years instead of five.
“United together and removed from the party divisions which have been imposed on us, we can achieve miracles,” Stavrou said.
Whether he has the opportunity to become an instrument of change however, depends on the public who have the power to elect him. “Abstention is pretty much the most stupid thing you can do.
“Is it worth it, allowing those we complain about to carry on ruling?” Stavrou asked.
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