Do you have any questions for the future President?

Much has happened in the political scene in Cyprus since the last posting on the 21st of August. Campaigns were finally launched, candidate websites and blogs were created, statements are constantly made and issues have surfaced. Even one particular call for hara-kiri was debated! Harry Potter was mentioned and the relationship of King Arthur with Lancelot was brought up, albeit failing to call Merlin in the talks, the other perennial wizard of popular culture, aside from newcomer Harry Potter, who could have had a role on this election. Because, this is precisely what we all need right now. A magician well trained in the arts of fortunetelling in order to tell us who is going to be our next president, considering the fact that all three contenders get, more or less, the same percentage points in the various polls conducted and published. The incumbent president leads the polls, but the two other challengers are following right behind, and the difference between the three is diminishing at a constant rate. Therefore, the question for the statisticians is to determine the duration of the exposure to risk, which in this case is called time and has a deadline; the election date.

But leaving math aside, what about the public debate? What about the political discussion that is taking place? So far, is miserable. It all looks to me like a provincial competition for the mayor-ship of some third rated city of an obscure country still striving to discover its identity and place in the world. Do you agree? If you do, what do you do to change all that? Instead of complaining and saying nothing why don't we all request from the candidates to raise the bar on subjects dominating the public debate?

It is understood by communication and campaign experts that the simpler the message is the better for the receiver (i.e. the less processing it requires, thus the less objections will come up) but critical inquiry should be the foundation of the decision making mechanism of any mature person. Why then don't we ask the candidates in their well advertised websites and blogs or through the press to actually offer us well thought out positions and plans of action for the future? Why don't we ask them to tell us their vision for Cyprus and how they will go about and do it? Why, for example, don't we ask them to tell us where we will be in terms of our role inside the European Union, the common foreign and security policies and our participation in the Union international efforts, but we are only focusing our concern on whether the military service for conscripts will last for 18, 14 or 24 months? Why we talk about social policies and we are declaring hand outs for this or the other social group, but we say nothing about personal responsibility? Why we allow each candidate to issue statements comprising of lists of so called intellectuals or professors of one or the other topic that support them, but we fail to ask those "wise men" to actually tell us why they support one or the other? Why don't we ask the candidates to tell us how they will get Mr. Talat to abandon Ankara and the "establishment" in the occupied areas in order to join us in our motherland, but we are satisfied when they debate whether he can do it or not? The question should not be about the "why not" aspect of any issue, but about the "how to" approach.

The reason we are not asking those questions and many more of similar nature, it is because we think that it is not our job to do so. The other reason is, perhaps, our innate or intuitive ability to protect our selves from disappointment. Because we will be sadly surprised and feel empty if we discover that our chosen one, no matter who he or she is, is not who we thought and wanted him to be. It is like acknowledging a mistake we have been doing for many years. And that is a failure we can't accept, because by doing so we run the risk of challenging the entire system of beliefs we have been espousing for all those years we were imbedded into a certain set of ideological parameters. Therefore, we turn away and we see what we want to see.

Or maybe is something much simpler. In the case of us, Cypriots, I think it is. The reason that we will vote the way we have always voted rests primarily on one very simple criterion. We vote who we know better and who can get our job done in time of need. We vote the person we have access to in order to secure our direct personal interests better. This is the reason why we are divided in almost three equal segments of 33 percent of the vote. If we add the votes we get those percentages we see in the polls, give or take a couple of points. Some people call it party loyalty. I call it opportunism and corporatism. I also call it rational choice for any rent seeking person. Whether, at the end, we will get the rent or not is another matter…

AKEL, DISI, DIKO, EDEK: Who stands to gain and loose from Mr. Christofias candidature?

So, this is it! The Secretary General of AKEL is running for president of the Republic! The tripartite arrangement between AKEL, DIKO and EDEK is over...at least for now. DISI is supporting former minister of foreign Affairs and current Euro MP, Dr. Kasoulides and Mr. Themistocleous, former minister of Agriculture announced his candidature some time ago, but so far there has been no reaction to it, from any major or minor political party.

The question still begs whether he will "disrupt" the political environment; offer something that will attract voters from outside his party and particularly from those groups within the other parties that do not agree with the unequivocal support to the current president, Mr. Papadopoulos. I think he will try to be that candidate, but I am not sure he will succeed. He will play the usual game. AKEL hopes that Mr. Kasoulides candidature will manage to attract those moderate voters within EDEK and DIKO who don't like the Papadopoulos line in foreign and domestic policies, thus causing enough damage to Mr. Papadopoulos candidature, allowing, in turn, Mr. Christofias to pass the first round threshold. Moreover, AKEL plans to attract those left-leaning voters from within DIKO who were not been "taken care off" by Mr. Papadopoulos, and who may like him out of the way so as to broker a new deal with AKEL in the "second Sunday!" In short, AKEL does have a good chance.

I am not sure what was exactly debated within the soviet-style AKEL apparatus, but the decision is a win – win for AKEL. If Mr. Christofias doesn't get to the second round, they still have a chance to support Mr. Papadopoulos in a qui pro quo fashion, even though their leverage to secure returns will diminish from the vary fact that, in this scenario, Mr. Kasoulides will be the other (non) option for AKEL. Especially, if EDEK decides to support Mr. Kasoulides in this case.

The other party that managed to square the circle is EDEK. They will go with Mr. Papadopoulos, and if he gets elected Mr. Omirou will be the new "big Kahuna" in the next administration. If Mr. Papadopoulos fails to get to the second round, EDEK still has the chance to break a deal with AKEL. And their leverage will not be diminished at all since they can swing the other way and support Mr. Kasoulides, and even claim that their support will provide "guaranties" that various ideas in respect to the Cyprus issue will remain...ideas.

Therefore, who looses? Obviously DIKO stands to loose the most, if Mr. Papadopoulos fails to advance to the second round. In such a case, DIKO will find it very hard to break any deal with Mr. Kasoulides, because of the differences between them in the handling of the Cyprus issue, and more importantly, because of the unwillingness of a large segment of DISI to cooperate with DIKO. However, voices and arguments calling for a "revised" DIKO may be presented, and maybe Mr. M. Kyprianou, Mr. Galanos and others may have a chance for a comeback, in this case.

What about EUROKO? The safest and smartest thing for EUROKO to do, is to copy EDEK strategy. They can go with Mr. Papadopoulos for now, and if he doesn't get through, they can switch to Mr. Kasoulides. And it will be even easier for them to do so than EDEK, because there is a good chance Mr. Kasoulides will have the support of another small party, EURODIMOKRATIA of Mr. Prodromou. If that happens, Mr. Kasoulides will have enough credibility to claim that his candidature truly synthesizes among all the Cyprus issue positions, thus making it easier for Mr. Sillouris party to satisfy the ideological concerns of his party. Whether the various personalities in DISI, EUROKO and EURODIMOKRATIA can get along, considering their past relationship, is another matter, and in high power stakes, mostly irrelevant.

In any case, the above scenarios do not attempt to provide any "fortune teller – like" prediction of the outcome of the next presidential election, but do attempt to indicate the risk environment each party is facing, overall. And like any other scenario, they are useful only if they can help those affected taking the steps necessary to cancel out those scenarios that don't suit them.