Greek Cypriots have re-elected Nicos Anastasiades as their eighth president in what is seen as a ringing endorsement of his stable leadership over the past five years.
The 71-year-old conservative won a second five-year term on Sunday with 56% of the vote. His opponent, the leftist-backed independent Stavros Malas, took 44%.
There were scenes of jubilation in Nicosia as news of the incumbent’s 12-point lead reached the campaign headquarters of Anastasiades’ Democratic Rally party (Dysi). Supporters poured on to the streets holding Cypriot, Greek and party flags, chanting slogans and honking horns. “Victory is a beautiful thing,” said Christos Papamichael, a Dysi activist.
Addressing followers soon after, the leader vowed to reactivate peace talks aimed at reconciling Cyprus’ Greek and Turkish communities.
“The biggest challenge we face is reunifying our country. I will continue to work with the same determination in a bid to achieve our common goal – ending foreign occupation and reunifying our state. There are no winners or losers, just Cyprus.”
Anastasiades had long been the frontrunner of a lacklustre electoral campaign marked by voter abstention.
But suspense had hovered over Sunday’s runoff after an inconclusive first round that saw Malas gain an unexpected 30.2% of the vote. The strong performance had sparked enthusiasm that the 50-year-old geneticist, who was running with the backing of the Progressive Party of Working People, Akel, could defy polls and score a spectacular upset.
In the end the electorate, putting financial considerations first, went for Antastasiades, who has been widely credited with navigating Cyprus’ extraordinary economic recovery since he took over the country, amid scenes of chaos, in 2013.
His victory on Sunday amounted to vindication of policies that, far from popular, had put the island back on a sustainable path after the collapse of its banking system and a €10bn EU–IMF-sponsored bailout. At nearly 4%, Cyprus had the eurozone’s highest growth rate in 2017.
“On the economy he has done very, very, very, well,” said Giorgos Skoufaris, a pensioner, flicking a set of worry beads after casting his ballot. “So why not give him our vote, especially when he has said this will be his last term?”
The banking crisis, blamed squarely on the ineptitude of the then Akel government, had been the most traumatic event to befall Cyprus since the Turkish invasion. In an unprecedented step, depositors were forced to foot the bill of the EU rescue programme with savings over €100,000 automatically slashed from bank accounts. Anastasiades’ deft handling of the crisis could now give him the space to focus on finally healing the Mediterranean island’s division.
Ankara ordered a full -scale invasion of the island, seizing its northern third in response to an Athens inspired coup aimed at uniting it with Greece. Some 40,000 Turkish troops have been stationed there ever since.
Repeated efforts at conciliation since have been unsuccessful, although negotiations are believed to have come close to reunifying the two communities before collapsing acrimoniously in Switzerland last July.
“There will now be continuity, which is a positive thing, for the economy, for the prospect of a solution and for the EU’s role in the eastern Mediterranean,” said Cleopatra Kitti, an international consultant based in Nicosia who advises corporations and governments. “Partition is unsustainable. I think Anastasiades is smart enough to realise that there needs to be a deal, that this cannot go on, that without it there is bound to be some kind of conflict.”
Anastasiades has repeatedly said he wants reunification despite upsetting pro-solution Cypriots when the UN-mediated talks broke down and he left the negotiating table last summer. “The status quo is unacceptable and its prolongation will have negative consequences for the Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots,” the lobby group Unite Cyprus Now said in a statement congratulating the president. “Let us not hold our bright future hostage to our troubled past.”
- This article was amended on 5 February 2018 to replace the picture with a photograph of Nicos Anastasiades.