Fury at AKEL call for end to school parades

A SUGGESTION by AKEL to scrap school parades was yesterday met with an outraged reaction by DISY deputy Andreas Themistocleous.

In a written announcement by the head of AKEL’s Education Office, George Loukaides, the ruling party called for a cancellation of the pupils’ two annual parades to mark national holidays, describing them as an outdated tradition.

Themistocleous said AKEL announcements came as no surprise anymore. “This is part of AKEL’s attack against our history and education, which was expressed after the election of [Demetris] Christofias and each day it is becoming all the more savage and outspoken,” said the DISY deputy.

“It is not the school parades that must stop, but the AKEL assaults against the history and education of the Greeks of Cyprus,” he added.

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.