Our View: Time for Disy to make a stand, about anything

Speaking about his intention to join the contest for the Disy presidential candidacy on Omega TV, former health minister Giorgos Pamborides said his plan was to appeal to voters beyond the confines of Disy, including those for the Centre and the Left. His first objective, however, was to bring back to the party the large number of alienated Disy voters who sought options on the right of Disy. Many of them had defected to Elam and had to return, said Pamborides, without explaining how he could do this. And he avoided saying how he would attract the Disy voters who had either joined the Nikos Christodoulides camp or supported the president while remaining in the party. The big question is how these defectors could be brought back to the party. Would he embrace the far-right nationalism of Elam, which is emphatically anti-settlement, xenophobic, religious and populist on economic issues to bring back these people? These former Disy voters are the demographic that would vote for Christodoulides whether from inside or outside the party. What Pamborides and party leader Annita Demetriou, who will also be standing for the candidacy, do not see or do not want to see is that Disy does not stand for anything, politically and economically. It has become just another middle of the road party that goes with the political flow that is directed by President Christodoulides. On what issue has Disy taken a meaningful public stand against a government decision in the three-and-a-half years Christodoulides has been in office? Most recently, the government has handled reform of the pension system in the most embarrassingly amateurish way, changing its plans every week, its only intention being to win votes, but Disy, which is supposed to be the party of financial prudence, has happily played along. When Disy approves of this shoddy, populist reform, how will it convince anyone that its candidate would be better than Christodoulides? Worse still, it has given the president a free ride on the Cyprus problem. Disy always prided itself for its pragmatism and its commitment to the pursuit of a settlement, but it is now applauding Christodoulides’ tactics, which are quite clearly aimed at maintaining the status quo and, ultimately, cementing partition. Of course, if it openly criticised the president’s superficial interest in the resumption of the talks, how would it bring back the hardliners among its supporters that have joined Elam or now support Christodoulides? Disy, sadly, has become another party of the Centre, like Diko and Dipa, which does not really stand for anything. It cannot even engage in meaningful opposition to the government as this role is now being performed exclusively by Akel. In the end, what would be the point of having a Disy candidate standing against Christodoulides given that the party has no alternative proposal of government to offer?