By ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ (GREEK) TÜRKÇE (TURKISH)
Various issues arise from this story involving Nikos Christodoulides’ (private) conversations, which were published by Politis. The first is the naivety and frivolity with which a presidential candidate, a diplomat, who has been rehearsing the wearing of a suit for years and meticulously ironing its every crease so that he always looks dressed to the nines, trusts anyone, and not only shares his opinions on politicians and journalists with him, but also orders him – or at least that’s the picture we got – to create fake profiles that will vilify anyone they consider an enemy (which in the microcosm of [campaign] teams, are many) and deify Christodoulides himself.
The second is the absurdity of grumbling before his supporters that he is at the centre of a concerted slander attack aimed at deconstructing his image – “you can keep the mud, I will keep the dignity of the people and move forward…,” he said last Wednesday, speaking at the Marios Tokas amphitheatre – while at the same time, according to a few reported quotes, you appear to be using the same practices, slandering three journalists: the first one for taking big bucks to support the Annan Plan, the other for being on a certain party’s ‘payroll’, and about the third he only said “various people tell me that now he is…”. Paradoxical, too, is to avoid addressing the people as a whole, but to choose to refer indirectly to these issues as they arise, speaking only before your applauders.
The cases are beyond comparison, but this reminds me of one of our presidents who, while the universe was burning around him, he was addressing his party’s audience by saying “Thank you for the large turnout / the people also had to express themselves.” I am also aware that there is a serious issue surrounding the privacy of [online] conversations – which we all have – but I want us to be honest. If all that was made public involved another politician, there would be hell to pay. We wouldn’t be dealing with the privacy issues surrounding the case, nor would… Chrisis Pantelides deign to, supposedly, lower the level of discussion to that of gossip. Because, if, for example, it was Averof Neophytou who was caught with the goat on his back, such high politics would have gone out of the window from the get go. Both by politicians and by journalists who are playing dumb, even when their publications are being directly and indirectly insulted.
And precisely because the candidate speaks of dignity, let us try to keep it. Some of us, at least, are striving for it. Therefore, the most serious matter that emerges from this whole story, besides the frivolity, naivety and political judgment, is not the opinion that Nikos Christodoulides has of Vasilis Palmas or Annita Demetriou, or whether he thinks that Chrisis and Anastasia, who are currently supporting him, were handling anonymous Twitter accounts that described him as merely a front, nor whether tomorrow we will hear a new statement about other politicians. Not even the crack that lets another type of person, different from the one projected by the smile, show through. Such things we have more or less experienced before and it is certainly hard to be surprised by anything. Rather, it is the superficial reaction of the political sphere (I wonder why?), of the journalistic squad too (I wonder why?) and, most importantly, the “well, it’s no big deal, we have more serious problems to deal with” reaction of the Nikos Christodoulides faithful, as recorded on social media. And I use the word “faithful”, because, as a rule, faith also presupposes blindness.
Source: WITH A GOAT ON HIS BACK
