Speech by the General Secretary of the C.C. of AKEL A. Kyprianou at the 19th Congress of EDON

6th January 2018, Conference Hall, Nicosia

AKEL C.C. Press Office

On behalf of the C.C. of AKEL I address a warm greeting to the 19th Congress of EDON. I am certain that the deliberations and work that has been done will yield significant results; results that you will use to the benefit of the young generation of our country.

We have said many times that EDON makes us and the People’s Movement of the Left proud. Why?

We are proud because EDON puts young people on the path of struggle for the noblest ideals that humanity has given birth to; because EDON is the militant voice that stands up and opposes neo-fascism, racism and nationalism; the thousands of youthful hearts struggling for the reunification of our homeland; the force that gets young people involved and active countering apathy and guiding them in the small and big struggles for their own future. We are proud of EDON because at every small and big event, from voluntary campaigns organized to clean up a park in some local neighborhood up to the organization of a Pancyprian Festival of Youth and Students, it reminds us that there is hope. And this hope is EDON!

We need this hope for a better future because our region is plagued by tensions and conflicts; because our times generate complex and difficult problems; because the deadlocks are growing. We need this hope because the policies being imposed across Europe and Cyprus have filled the future of the young generation with deadlocks.

In Cyprus, the results of these policies are depressing. Six years of the Anastasiades-DISY administration in Cyprus have loaded on young people’s backs burdens that do not permit them to move forward.

According to a report released by the European Statistical Office, 27.7% of young people in Cyprus, that is to say 51,000 young people, are at risk of poverty and social exclusion.

Thirty thousand young people face serious material deprivation, while 76.7% are forced to live with their parents because they don’t have the economic capability to live on their own.

Almost a third of young people in Cyprus cannot pay their bills and installments, cannot afford to go on a week’s vacation and cannot meet their basic essential needs or address emergency expenses.

72.5% of unemployed young people aged 25-34 cannot find a job even though they are graduates of tertiary education.

The proportion of young people aged between 25 and 34 living with their parents has increased from 27.3% to 33.7% in just two years.

These are all the result of Anastasiades’ policies and the ruling class of the European Union.

Lately, the governing ruling forces have been parading in front of TV cameras informing us about the growth being recorded and about the surplus they are achieved. The economy is indeed growing. But this growth is accompanied by inequalities that are also growing. There is indeed growth.

But where does this growth stem from and who benefits from it?

The casino and passport economy generates profits for the privileged few, a “get rich quick” economy and “bubble” phenomena for society. It’s the privileged few that are benefiting from this growth, while the majority see their labour being deregulated and their salaries and wages remaining curbed.

Recently the Cyprus Labour Institute (INEK) of the Pancyprian Federation of Labour released their annual Report on the Economy and Employment. All the findings of the Report confirm what we have been saying for a long time.

First: yes, there is growth and there are profits, but all the indexes illustrate that profits are being distributed to the detriment of labour and in favour of capital.

Second: yes, the unemployment rate has fallen, but increases in real wages are minimal, next to nothing.

Thirdly, unlike all previous years, the situation of working people is disconnected from the economic growth recorded, given that wages and the income share of labour are not in line GDP growth.

Does all this concern the school pupil, student and the young person who just wants to find a job? The answer is undeniably yes it does.

It concerns school pupils as it affects their education and health because it concerns his/her parents who have to do everything possible so that, for example, they can pay tuition classes to sit exams every four months, the final exams, to pay for their clothes, recreation and leisure and hobby needs.

It concerns the student who has seen the Student Care scheme curbed, who cannot study if he/she can’t pay private universities’ tuition fees, who cannot afford the rent of an apartment because of the absurd increases in rent, who cannot even buy a used car because he/she fear the cost of car license fees.

It concerns young people who cannot begin to build their life because the banks don’t give loans, rents are soaring high and wages are rock bottom. It concerns young people because even though they may have a degree and a postgraduate degree they work for a thousand euros a month, work on Sundays, find work for half a day with half the wages, work without social insurance, health and medical care and welfare.

In the face of all these deadlocks a large section of young people believes that nothing can change. It has given up hope, unfortunately, capitulating to the slogan that “everyone is the same.” We will not tire in saying that “not everyone is the same.” We will devote all our energies to prove that “not everyone is the same.”

AKEL has very clear political positions promoting young people’s rights. It takes political initiatives for young people, both inside and outside the Parliament and is struggling to support their assertions. If one makes the effort to see, for example, what each Party tables in the House of Representatives and what positions each party supports all issuing affecting young people, he/she will realize that the Party of the young generation is AKEL.

Let’s take labour issues. Not everyone is the same.

During the Christofias government, a relevant bill was passed in Parliament for the institutional and legislative safeguarding of the application of collective agreements and the possibility of extending them to the entire economic sector. The Anastasiades government withdrew this bill. It was again tabled by AKEL as a draft bill. The competent Ministry, the Employers’ Associations OEV and KEVE are against it. As the discussions in the relevant Parliamentary Commission have demonstrated, neither do the other parties agree.

The legislative enactment of minimum binding terms and conditions of employment, such as the need for a minimum salary for newly hired employees, the provision of the 13th month salary payment, overtime compensation and the establishment of compulsory holidays for those workers not covered by a collective agreement, represent AKEL’s long standing policy, which the other Parties do not seem to share, even more so the Anastasiades Government. Needless to say let me remind young people about the struggles we have waged inside the House of Representatives on the issue of working hours in shops, but also about our repeated appeals we issued and the proposals we submitted with regards the need for the government to elaborate plans to provide support to and care of infants, minors and children, especially for families on low incomes.

We are not all the same.

AKEL is the Party that has tabled the draft bill to provide more protection for working people who are absent from work due to disability, and especially for serious health reasons. AKEL is the Party that tabled the bill to improve the legislation on child benefits. AKEL is the Party that has tabled proposals to improve legislation on the Minimum Guaranteed Income. AKEL is the party that has tabled a draft bill so that the Special Needs Fund for People with Disabilities won’t be abolished – on the contrary that it should be supported by the state budget with a similar amount so that the emergency needs of people with disabilities are covered. AKEL is the Party that has tabled legislative proposals to support every mother. AKEL is the Party that succeeded in an amendment being passed in the 2019 State Budget for the provision of student grants that are being curbed increasingly every year by the Anastasiades government. AKEL is the Party taking initiatives to promote, for example, family policy measures to provide support to young couples on low incomes and state investment in social protection infrastructures and support for local government to implement social policies at a local level and much more.

We are not all the same.

AKEL is the Party – the only Party – that elaborated and submitted a comprehensive study on Special Education with specific proposals for its improvement and promotion. AKEL is the Party that has tabled a draft bill for the abolition of the four-month exam system; the Party which is struggling on the side of the teachers on contracts; the Party which is raising in the House of Representatives urgently the issue of the upgrading and expansion of Technical Schools, the pressing need for investment to be channeled in research and innovation. AKEL is the only Party which struggled for a ceiling to be put on private universities’ fees and briefed from the very beginning students about the total cost of their studies. AKEL is the only Party that raised the issue of the fairer distribution of the funds allocated to provide support for artistic and amateur cultural creation.

We are not all the same.

AKEL is the Party that is working with consistency, steadfastness and seriousness for the main issue that concerns the future of the coming generations of Cyprus: the reunification of our homeland and people.

History will judge Mr. Anastasiades very strictly. Firstly, because he did not resolutely oppose and combat nationalism, chauvinism and neo-fascism. We had serious and continuous outbreaks of neo-fascism and racism in schools and in society lately. There hasn’t been any reaction whatsoever from the President, who, as he confessed, believes that rapprochement and the cultivation of a culture of co-existence with the Turkish Cypriots is confined to having a drink with Akinci.

History will judge both Mr. Anastasiades, DISY and all those who since 2011 prepared the ground for the rise of the far right very strictly because back then the far-right served their interests in their destructive campaign against AKEL and D. Christofias. That’s why no one should be surprised by the outbreaks of nationalism and racism, by the attacks on Turkish Cypriots and the rise of neo-fascism. They were appeasing the monster so that it could do favours for them back then. Today they are caressing it to calm it down and don’t realize how much damage is being done to society. To combat neo-fascism consistency and determination are demanded, as well as very clear positions and not statements that are motivated by pre-election considerations and characterized by hypocrisy.

Big talk, patriotic rhetoric and patriotic sloganeering. In reality, however, in practice the barbed wire dividing our country directly threatens the future of the young generation.

What are the real options before us?  Should we take up arms and start a war?

In 1974, the so-called “national-minded” forces inflamed young people’s minds about “victories that the Nation would bring”. The result was that their actions led half of Cyprus to disaster and the other half full of refugees uprooted from their homes.

The invasion, occupation and ongoing colonization of the occupied territories directly threaten the survival of the Cypriot people, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, on the land that gave birth to them. The current situation is a slowly-ticking bomb placed at the very foundations of our homeland. Turkey maintains an occupying army in Cyprus with a force of up to 30,000 soldiers. Its military presence enables it to exercise control over the Turkish Cypriot community. The mass and uncontrolled colonization is threatening the identity and survival of everyone in the land that gave birth to us.

So how can this problem be solved?

It can only be solved by reversing the partitionist status quo and by solving the Cyprus problem with a solution acceptable to both communities that will lead to a lasting and stable peace. A solution that will reunite the island on the basis of the agreed framework and lead to a permanent and viable peace; that will create conditions of prosperity for all. That is and must remain the common goal of the struggle of Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots.

Unfortunately, the current situation does not create optimism that we are even close to achieving this goal. Mr. Anastasiades inherited the Cyprus problem from D. Christofias who had achieved joint communiqués safeguarding our side’s long-standing positions, with many issues agreed and recorded as convergences, with the chapter of energy a huge prospect and the sovereign rights of the Republic of Cyprus secured, with the international community acknowledging that our side was one step ahead in its readiness to solve the problem. What did Mr. Anastasiades himself do and at what phase has he led the Cyprus problem at?

Yes, it is a fact that the primary responsibility for the continuation of the de facto partition lies with Turkey, due to the intransigent positions it supports, its aggressive policy and provocative actions. This does not exonerate and relieve Mr. Anastasiades of the mistakes and amateur handlings that have been made. Recent examples include the Mont Peleran and Crans Montana conferences. What has subsequently followed isn’t any better. Mr. Anastasiades’ contradictions and regressions, which he himself characterized as his right to reflect on, have put the possibility of a two-state solution on the table.

Developments today aren’t just critical – they are decisive. Now is the time to say what is really going on and by their true name.

Either the Cyprus problem will be solved through an honorable compromise that will reunite our country and people, or we will open the door to the nightmare scenario of partition.

Either we will vindicate the common struggles we have waged Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots to be the masters in our country, or we will be handing half of our homeland and forfeiting the other half to foreign interests.

AKEL faced and is still came under an enormous attack because of our steadfast and consistent position on the Cyprus problem. Firstly, when certain forces and circles were speaking about a supposed common path pursued by governing DISY and AKEL, because Mr. Anastasiades was forced by developments themselves to follow our positions and adopt our proposals. When Mr. Anastasiades subsequently took other decisions and abandoned what he was saying, AKEL was accused of supporting “submissive positions” and proposals leading to “any solution”. They should all be ashamed of themselves.

These are tactics they employ, ever since the time the late historical leader of AKEL Ezekias Papaioannou wrote that he didn’t believe any other political leader had been slandered and attacked so much in Cyprus as himself because of the political positions he defended as the General Secretary of AKEL. The attack AKEL came under back then became a ferocious and destructive war when Demetris Christofias was elected President of the Republic of Cyprus because he dared to put in the public debate and on the table of the talks positions abolishing ethnic confrontation and which had as their cornerstone the common homeland, the common state, the common life of Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots; because he was bold enough to promote policies that challenged the interests of the establishment on our island. We should all know that is their position towards us, given that our policies and positions threaten their interests. We must steeled and united in order to resolutely combat them.

We insist and reiterate the same positions today that we supported back then, not out of any stubbornness, nor out of any “obsession” as certain forces and circles accuse us of, but because at the heart of the positions and proposals that were submitted is the timeless truth which Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots together have served over decades of struggles and sacrifices: A Cyprus that belongs to its people, that will be living together and not side by side. This is our vision for Cyprus. We serve this vision, believe in it and assert it. This is because we have at the centre of our attention everything that really threatens the future of Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots in Cyprus: Ankara’s policies that are seeking to incorporate and assimilate the Turkish Cypriot community. This is precisely why we do not forget to constantly underline the great efforts being made by the Turkish Cypriot progressive forces to protect the Turkish Cypriot community, its identity and character.

We are a voice that is struggling for the whole of Cyprus. We insist and shall continue to insist that the Turkish Cypriot, just like the Greek Cypriot community, will neutralize once and for all whatever threatens their survival only when they manage to live together within the framework of a bizonal, bicommunal federation. Only when they again begin laying the foundations of a common life and the waging of common social and political action within the framework of a reunified state which shall be a continuation of the Republic of Cyprus, with a single sovereignty, a single citizenship and a single international personality, ensuring that the two communities shall be living and working together for their common future. With political equality as provided for in the relevant resolutions of the United Nations and free form any guarantee and intervention rights.

It is true that our era is difficult and demanding. It is true that our Party and the People’s Movement of the Left have a hard struggle ahead of us, a path of struggle that never ends. EDON is also at the forefront of this struggle. It is true that the militants and members of EDON are waging a very difficult struggle against impoverishment, neo-fascism and against a rotten system that is old, but refuses to die. But this struggle is the most beautiful of all.

As the poet wrote, we haven’t lived the most beautiful days yet. You are all the most beautiful days. It is the dawn of your own struggle, it is the dawn of EDON’s struggle for peace and social justice, for progress and socialism!

Every success in your struggles!