A BITTER quarrel between Central Bank Governor Afxentis Afxentiou and House Watchdog Committee chairman Christos Pourgourides over Afxentiou’s Governor’s alleged responsibilities concerning the Cyprus Stock Exchange fiasco yesterday turned into a parliamentary row.
At the same time there seemed to be a general admission that a number of deputies as well as state officials had bought shares on private placement and Pourgourides threatened to publicise the names in question.
Afxentiou, who on Wednesday was grilled by the committee over private placement shares made available to his family and who was later asked to resign, called on the watchdog committee to dissolve itself. The committee is carrying out an investigation into alleged stock market frauds.
The Central Bank Governor defended himself, arguing that just because he had bought 3,600 shares from Cassoulides and £5,000 worth of shares from Louis Cruise Lines, it did not mean he had led on other investors.
Pourgourides reiterated his view that Afxentiou should resign, charging that his children used their father’s name to get tens of thousands of shares through private placement.
The conflict yesterday took an unexpected turn when the House President and opposition parties criticised Pourgourides’ handling of the whole affair. AKEL parliamentary spokesman Andreas Christou said that a parliamentary investigation should not develop into a personal confrontation.
“The latest events give the impression that the committee is acting like a court imposing penalties and ordering: ‘You should go to jail, you should go home’,” Christou complained.
The AKEL deputy claimed that Afxentiou was not the only one who had bought shares on private placement, as party officials and ministries’ general directors had also done so.
DIKO’s acting chairman Nicos Cleanthous shared Christou’s view, arguing that the committee had personalised the CSE investigation. KISOS chairman Yiannakis Omirou charged that the recent actions of the committee had put its credibility and prestige on the line. He suggested that according to the law deputies on the committee were only allowed to position themselves on issues under investigation in closed sessions and not during public debates.
DISY parliamentary spokesman Demetris Syllouris defended Pourgourides’ handling of the issue, saying that “sometimes deputies go over the top but nothing can beat the stock market fiasco.”
Later, during his speech before the House Plenum, Pourgourides lashed out at his colleagues for remaining apathetic to Afxentiou’s call on the watchdog committee to dissolve itself. He vowed to publicise the names of all who had purchased shares on private placement, “including deputies and politicians”.
House President and AKEL leader Demetris Christofias hit back at Pourgourides, saying: “I intend to deal with Afxentiou’s statements as I will deal with some deputies calling on people to resign during parliamentary meetings.”
Later Christofias issued a letter dismissing Afxentiou’s statements as disrespectful to “bodies that represent the people”.
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.
