Statements by the General Secretary of AKEL S.Stefanou on the meeting with the President of DISY party

 

 

27 March 2023, AKEL C.C. Press Office, Nicosia

The General Secretary of the AKEL Central Committee, Stefanos Stefanou, today received the President of the Democratic Rally DISY party, Anita Demetriou, at the central offices of AKEL.

Welcoming her and her colleagues to his office, S.Stefanou noted that AKEL is in favour of dialogue, making the following statements:

“Political life without dialogue cannot exist. The disagreements that do exist policy are legitimate too and I can say objective as well. Political parties have different ideologies, different starting points, and different perspectives. The point is to have the strength through our disagreements to discuss, to have a dialogue in an attempt to find consensus and understanding.

I believe that we can often do ourselves an injustice with the image we portray, because there is a dialogue between political forces – both inside and outside Parliament – on many different issues. It is good for citizens to know this. Dialogue helps to restore the trust that we should seek to forge between citizens, political life and citizens. When there is rationalism and reason prevails, we do not leave any room for populism to develop, which is a disease of our times that must be confronted. You have rightly said that AKEL and DISY have many differences, but we have never abandoned dialogue and I am sure that we will from there onwards have the possibility to have a discussion  on the basis of a specific political agenda.

After all, the problems are there. Both with regards the Cyprus problem in particular and on the general problems that affect us. There’s the problem of poverty that affects households, and the issues concerning entanglement/interwoven interests and corruption that need to be combated in order to have a state based on the rule of law, and a number of other issues, with the Cyprus problem at the top of the list. This is precisely where the present and the future of the country depends on, so for that reason the effort to solve the Cyprus problem must be a top priority, at least as far as AKEL is concerned it is a top priority. We know that there is a discussion within the framework of the National Council, there will be a session of the National Council on Thursday and that’s where we will see precisely what the President of the Republic is going to do regarding the Cyprus problem.”

 

 

At the end of the meeting the General Secretary of AKEL said that during their meeting various issues were discussed and there was an exchange of views starting with the Cyprus problem.  Stefanos Stefanou said that “we will discuss the Cyprus problem next Thursday at the meeting of the National Council. We are waiting to be briefed by the President of the Republic so that we can now express our views in a more concrete manner, to make our own assessment of what the President says and to convey AKEL’s views.

“We also discussed other issues that have to do with the domestic political scene. Inevitably the work in the House of Representatives, Mrs. Demetriou is also the Speaker of the House and much of the work and activity of the political parties is also done within the House. I am sure that this debate will continue. As we have said we are open to dialogue always on the basis of the political agenda and the issues that the country, society, workers and the common people face.”