A TUMULTUOUS session of ruling DIKO’s Executive Bureau yesterday strove to agree on candidates for December’s municipal elections, as party scrapper Nikos Pittokopitis bowed out of the race for the Paphos mayorship.
The party’s top decision-making body was in a marathon session that dragged into the evening.
Pittokopitis, who in previous days spoke of an ‘inside plot’ to deny him the Paphos municipality, did not attend.
Once a party stalwart, the outspoken politician threatened last week to unleash a “political typhoon” of revelations unless his enemies stopped undermining him.
His most explosive allegation was that “certain quarters” had promised him the Paphos mayorship if he agreed to Eleni Mavrou’s candidacy for the Nicosia municipality, to which he objected.
Mavrou was one of the few AKEL members who came out openly in favour of the Annan plan in the April 2004 referendum. She was one of several personalities accused at the time of being in the pay of the Americans in what was denounced by opponents as a witch-hunt of ‘yes’ supporters.
Having failed to get re-elected to parliament last May, Pittokopitis turned his sights on the mayorship of Paphos, his hometown.
Pittokopitis’ blitz gave his party a new headache, barely after the three-way coalition between AKEL, EDEK and DIKO – after much haggling – reached a compromise formula for commonly acceptable candidates for the upcoming municipal elections.
Yesterday the former deputy did not attend the DIKO meeting, but instead sent a letter indicating his intentions.
It was confirmed Pittokopitis had decided to pull out of the race for Paphos, and that he tendered his resignation as party deputy chairman.
The man earmarked for the Paphos job is Savvas Vergas, a municipal councillor for the past nine years.
The withdrawal of Pittokopitis – who has become something of a loose cannon – would have come as a relief to DIKO cadres, who not only have to contend with the municipal elections but also with their own electoral congress later this month to nominate a new party chief.
DIKO was shaken up last month after President Papadopoulos announced he was stepping down as party chairman.
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