Tim W Hayes  01/23/2008 02:19:53 PM  From  DB/Inbox:  Search Results

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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 NICOSIA 001964 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/SE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL CY
SUBJECT: CYPROB POLITICS, NOT ISSUES, DOMINATE MUNICIPAL 
ELECTIONS RUN-UP 
 
¶1.  SUMMARY:  Greek Cypriots head to the polls December 17 to 
elect mayors, municipal councils, and, for the first time, 
school board members.  Other than vague demands for greater 
autonomy from Nicosia, issues have taken a back seat to 
politics in the months-long elections run-up.  Garnering the 
majority of media coverage are battles amidst the governing 
coalition -- composed of the EDEK, DIKO, and AKEL parties -- 
over mayoral candidate selection for Cyprus's largest cities. 
 Experts lament that such negotiations essentially anoint 
favored nominees, since combined the parties control 
two-thirds of registered voters.  Historically, however, 
personalities, not party allegiance, drive municipal races, 
presenting opportunities for opposition candidates and 
independents.  Opinions are divided over the significance of 
the municipal campaign:  some claim victory at the local 
level portends greater success in the presidential elections 
fourteen months hence, while others argue little linkage 
exists.  In addition to this overview, Post will offer 
details and predictions for key city races Septel.  END 
SUMMARY 
 
------------------------------ 
Election Fatigue Looks Certain 
------------------------------ 
 
¶2.  2006 has proven a tiring year, elections-wise, with a 
Parliamentary race occurring in June and ecclesiastical 
elections to choose the Cypriot Archbishop concluding in 
November.  On December 17, Greek Cypriots again trudge to the 
polls.  Up for grabs are 33 mayorships (24 in the 
government-controlled areas and nine north of the Green 
Line), city council slots in those municipalities, and 466 
village elder slots ("kinotarhes" in Greek, "Mukhtars" in 
Turkish) and corresponding community boards.  For the first 
time since Cyprus won independence, voters will choose 
municipal school boards (although, with curriculum dictated 
by the Ministry of Education and Culture, their power appears 
scant).  Another first, as a result of Cyprus's 2004 
accession to the European Union, non-Cypriot EU citizens may 
cast ballots December 17 and can even stand for election in 
all but mayoral races.  According to Ministry of Interior 
statistics, these EU "green card" holders comprise 
approximately one percent of registered voters. 
 
--------------------------- 
What They Are, What They Do 
--------------------------- 
 
¶3.  As one might expect of an island of one million 
residents, the political system of Cyprus leans heavily 
toward centralization, not federalism.  Unlike in the United 
States, for example, Cypriot municipalities and villages do 
not control schools, police, emergency services, nor 
hospitals.  Like U.S. counterparts, however, their 
responsibilities include road construction and maintenance, 
sanitation, and zoning enforcement.  Property taxes represent 
local governments' greatest funding source, followed by 
national government transfers and user fees (parking meters, 
parking fines, and the like.)  Larger municipalities can 
issue bonds for capital improvements; many, including 
Nicosia, are heavily indebted and have turned to the central 
government for relief. 
 
¶4.  Local elections first occurred in colonial Cyprus after 
the outbreak of World War II; Communist AKEL, the nation's 
oldest and largest party, dominated.  Colonial administrators 
would clamp down on all forms of electoral activity during 
the subsequent struggle for Cypriot independence, but the 
birth of the Republic of Cyprus in 1960 brought renewed 
politicking and elections at all levels.  Once Turkish 
Cypriots withdrew from all government institutions in 
response to heavy intercommunal fighting in 1963-64, however, 
the Greek Cypriots remaining in power altered the status quo. 
 For over twenty years, Nicosia appointed mayors, councilmen 
and village elders, until Parliament in 1986 passed 
legislation breaking the RoC's stranglehold on power. 
 
---------------------- 
An Election Day Primer 
---------------------- 
 
¶5.  Over 500,000 are expected to cast ballots December 17, 
MoI Director for Elections Demetris Demetriou informed 
PolChief November 6.  Voting was mandatory for all Greek 
Cypriots over 18 and for registered, non-Cypriot EU citizens 
residing on the island.  The latter list held 4,000 names; 
most hailed from Greece or the UK.  Non-Cypriots might even 
run for council or school board seats, Demetriou noted, 
although their chances of victory looked remote.  Candidates 
had to announce their intention to run by November 17. 
 
¶6.  Voters in municipalities would file three separate 
ballots, Demetriou continued:  one for mayor, one for the 
city council, and one for the school board.  Regarding the 
latter, multi-seat contests, Cyprus employed a modified 
candidate-list system in which voters selected both their 
preferred party and their favored individuals within it. 
Such a system was more democratic than a straight candidate 
list, where parties, not voters, rank-ordered candidates. 
"Refugees" -- those Cypriots who fled south to the 
RoC-controlled areas in 1974, plus their descendants -- could 
vote in both their city of domicile and their original, 
now-"occupied" municipality. 
 
¶7.  Election preparations were proceeding smoothly, Demetriou 
offered, although he expected minor difficulties in smaller 
villages, where residence requirements for candidacies 
sometimes presented problems.  Parties and nominees generally 
respected electoral laws, he contended, and voter fraud was 
rare in Cyprus.  To illustrate, Demetriou bragged that the EU 
had dispatched an observer mission before the May 2006 
Parliamentary elections.  The team left before the vote, 
however, seeing no signs of malfeasance and no need to 
remain.  Under current RoC electoral law, no polls may be 
published after December 10 and all campaigning must conclude 
December 15.  One are which ought to see reform was campaign 
finance,Demetriou thought.  Currently the law set an 
asurdly low limit for spending on hic al prtes(and 
their electoral overseers) ignored.  Efforts to revise the 
law and ratchet upward the finance caps had failed. 
 
¶8.  Demetriou expected a hectic day.  The elections required 
10,000 workers to man 1,800 voting stations island-wide, 
provide security, tally votes and announce results.  He 
placed the cost at 2.5 million Cyprus Pounds ($5.5 million). 
  This would be no high-tech tour de force -- in rural areas 
especially, voters feared tabulators and touch-screens, 
preferring paper and pen.  The MoI was pushing Parliament to 
amend the electoral law to keep the polls open an extra hour, 
figuring that completing the third ballot, for school boards, 
would increase the average time required to vote. 
Regardless, Demetriou expected the first results to become 
available just 30 minutes after closing time. 
 
---------------------------- 
The Run-Up to E(lection)-Day 
---------------------------- 
 
¶9.  Media have paid minimal attention to candidates' 
platforms and party promises during the pre-electoral period. 
 All in the race have chanted demands for additional 
"aftodiikisy" (autonomy) from Nicosia, but put little flesh 
on that bone.  Of greater interest to newswriters here has 
proven the candidate selection process.  In late summer, for 
example, pundits questioned whether Cyprus's current 
governing coalition -- an ideologically-disparate 
agglomeration of nationalist DIKO, Communist AKEL and 
Socialist EDEK -- could fulfill their intention to field 
joint candidates and nominee lists in 33 municipalities and 
numerous towns and villages.  The southwestern city of Paphos 
proved particularly problematic, with EDEK digging in for its 
standard-bearer.  In response to the blatant backroom 
dealings, commentators of varied political stripes cried 
foul, complaining that coalition leaders were preempting 
voters and "electing" their chosen few. 
 
¶10.  The partnership seems to have survived mostly intact. 
In the two biggest races, however, in Nicosia and the port 
city of Limassol, experts suspect some coalition voters will 
abandon the chosen candidates, respectively Eleni Mavrou and 
Andreas Christou.  Both fervently supported the Annan Plan, 
the UN's 2004 effort to reunify Cyprus, and both earned the 
enmity of President Tassos Papadopoulos's DIKO for doing so. 
Nonetheless, Christou, once Papadopoulos's most popular 
minister, enjoys a commanding lead in Limassol, and Mavrou's 
numbers are climbing in the capital. 
 
---------------------- 
Reading the Tea Leaves 
---------------------- 
 
¶11.  Opinions differ regarding the significance of local 
elections in this highly-centralized state.  Respected 
journalist and political analyst Christoforos Christoforou, 
for example, believes that parties which discount local races 
do so at their own peril.  Mayors and councilmen often poll 
higher approval ratings than RoC officials, Christoforou told 
PolChief November 22, owing to constituents' beliefs they are 
more responsive to citizens' needs than their counterparts in 
Nicosia.  Satisfaction -- or disgust -- with local 
politicians and their respective parties can affect voters' 
decisions in follow-on national races, the analyst contends. 
To illustrate, Christoforou highlighted DISY's 1991 municipal 
campaign.  The right-wing party three years earlier had lost 
the presidency to a political newcomer, viewed the local 
races as useful springboards back to power, and fielded (and 
supported) top-notch candidates.  DISY fared well at the 
municipal level and, two years hence, sent Glafkos Clerides 
to the Presidential Palace. 
 
¶12.  Negative electoral "leverage" existed as well.  The 
governing coalition faced tough races in Limassol and 
Nicosia, Christoforou ventured.  Could it survive until 2008 
if it lost both?  Only if its candidates dominated the 
remaining key races, providing party spin-meisters with 
necessary grist.  Regardless of the December 17 outcome, 
however, he expected no rash decisions from either opposition 
or coalition regarding the presidential campaign.  "Not until 
April will the picture become clearer," he concluded. 
 
¶13.  Other analysts consulted see zero linkage between local 
and national politics.  AKEL-identified and/or -supported 
candidates would emerge the most voted December 17, they 
predicted, owing to the party's historic grassroots strength. 
 The party had never proven able to replicate that 
performance on the national level, however, since voters, 
while comfortable with a "Red" mayor, would never award the 
Palace to the Communists.  Nor would future national leaders 
surface from December's elections, their logic goes, since 
local pols rarely ascend past city halls to obtain 
Parliamentary or ministerial positions (those jobs normally 
fall to party faithful).  Finally, personalities trump party 
affiliation at the municipal level; the popular mayor of a 
Nicosia suburb, running now as a DISY-supported independent, 
earlier had won three terms each time representing a 
different party. 
SCHLICHER