Tales from the Coffeeshop: Please pay attention to the former president

RETIREMENT is something that Nik I is just not comfortable with. He just refuses to accept that he no longer has a role to play and keeps finding excuses to bring him some public attention. These pitiful efforts get him a mention in the news, but do not prompt much reaction, apart from sad columnists like me and a couple of others, who feel sorry for him and, compassionately, pay him some attention. A lack of material to write about may also be an explanation. On Tuesday the former prez released a 30-page diatribe criticising the findings of the Anti-corruption Authority’s investigation into Mafia State. He disputed all seven suggestions of probable criminal offences, which were based on mistaken interpretation of information and unreliable testimony, and accused the investigator of “unforgivable negligence.” His diatribe got some media coverage, but I am afraid it did not swing public opinion in his favour. Regardless of what was written in Mafia State, to most people Nik was a self-serving Prez, who implemented a state policy – citizenship by investment – that made him and his family huge amounts of moolah, as applicants were investing in Nik’s son-in-law’s properties. Related Articles • Anastasiades calls for Disy unity, rules out political comeback • Anastasiades restates Mafia State defence On the ‘balance of probability’ this could have been corruption. A DAY later he was back, this time playing the great unifier of Disy, which he had split in the first place by backing the candidacy of his protégé Nik II and undermining, at every opportunity, the candidacy of the party leader Averof. In an appearance on CyBC, he said it pained him to “to see Disy going through everything it is going through because of personal ambitions.” Personal ambition was something the principled Nik always detested and never allowed to influence his decisions. He openly reprimanded all those leadership contenders who failed to embrace his principle that “loyalty to the party and, by extension to the country, must outweigh individual aspiration.” The cliché about people in glass houses came to mind listening to him. He had wasted the best opportunity for a Cyprus settlement in 2017 to focus on his re-election. But of course, this was not a case of his personal aspiration outweighing his love of the country. There was unfinished passport business he needed to attend to – lines of investors waiting to buy properties – a duty he would not be able to fulfill if there was any form settlement. SOME suggest there was a hidden agenda behind Nik’s call for the sidelining of personal ambitions. It was the first step of backing the re-election of Nik II. He did not say it, but he implied that the only way for the presidential candidacy squabbling in Disy to stop would be by backing the candidacy of his boy. By Annita, Averof and Pamborides putting aside their personal ambitions and backing the candidacy on Nik II his re-election would be a dead certainty, while Disy unity would be preserved. Phil’s presidential spokesman, Andreas Bimbishis, wrote a column about this the next day, just in case some idiots did not understand what Nik I was hinting at. After praising Nik’s wisdom, Nik II’s personal spokesman informed us that there were solutions to Disy’s problems. This, however, would require Annita and Averof to put aside “their personal and party egotism,” said the wise scribe, echoing the corrupt Nik. While the leader had the right to put Disy on the course she chose, “this course cannot be determined by personal egotism, because the result would be anything positive.” It does not seem to have occurred to Bimbishis and Nik I, who shun personal egotism, that if their hero had not placed his personal ambition above his party loyalty and did not allow his personal egotism to dictate his decisions, he would never have become our Prez in 2023. THE FORMER leader of the public parasites’ union, Glafkos Hadjimourmouris also joined in the Averof-bashing in the last week. But the retired public parasite-in-chief was not bashing Averof only for his personal ambition and his ‘over-simplified’ Cyprob views. In an article in last Monday’s Phil, completely out of the blue, Hadjimourmouris attacked Averof for speaking disrespectfully about the Prez on the telly. “It is impermissible for an experienced politician to refer in such a belittling way to the elected president of the country,” he wrote. “In a European democracy, political culture dictates a basic level of respect in relations between political leaders,” said the self-righteous moaner and urged Averof to refrain from “cheap, communication debanking of institutions”. It would not surprise me if Hadjimourmouris’ public oath of allegiance to the Prez may have something to do with pension reform, a reminder that parasite pensions must also be increased. SPEAKING of pension reform, it appears that Friday’s meeting did not go very well because many questions were raised and unions were demanding a higher minimum wage. One thing was clear, however. The government is in such a hurry to finalise the reform and get it approved by the House before the end of the year that Labour Minister Marinos Mousiottas has decided to have two meetings of the Labour Advisory Council every week. Higher pensions have to be in place in 2027 because they will be a vote winner for the Prez if he decides to seek re-election. Then again, he may listen to his mentor, put the interest of the country above personal egotism and decide not to stand. PATRIOTIC forces scored another triumph over the Turkish occupation. They persuaded footballing giant Barcelona to cancel the children’s football camp in the occupied north. Once the news that there would be a Barcelona football camp was out, it was only a matter of time before it was cancelled. The Cyprus Football Association took all the necessary measures to have the two-week camp in the north cancelled. This allowed Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman to have another moan about the isolation of the Turkish Cypriot, but it did not prevent him from attending his scheduled meeting with the Prez on Wednesday afternoon. The only thing they agreed on was to meet once a week from now on. This would allow them to meet three times before they go to New York to inform the UNSG that no progress had been made at their weekly meetings. EVERYONE must have received the CY-Alert on their mobile phone on Saturday. It was extremely loud and annoying and unnecessary. Did we really need to be told that “in your area there is heavy rainfall with an increased risk of flooding?” Everyone had noticed the grey skies and heavy rainfall without needing to be briefed about it by the government. We were also advised to “avoid unnecessary travel” and to “remain at home for your safety.” I suppose it was a good way of testing whether Cy-Alert was working, even though this thing has a Big Brother side to it. Am I the only one who does not like the state sending me an alert whenever some bureaucrat decides I might be in danger? FAREWELL to Dolly Parton, who died on Tuesday aged 80. Was never a great fan of her music, but loved her personality, and not because of her giant boobs. She was a tough and resilient person, a true rag-to-riches story, extremely generous, a very smart businesswoman and very funny. Most importantly she was happy to laugh at herself. She was proud of her loud and garish outfits, saying “it costs a lot of money to look this cheap.” She also said: “I am a self-made woman, and I have the doctors’ bills to prove it.” Perhaps her most well-known quote was “I am not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I am not dumb… and I also know that I am not blonde.”