{"id":18676,"date":"2025-02-05T08:30:18","date_gmt":"2025-02-05T05:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/penna.cydialogue.org\/?p=18676"},"modified":"2025-02-05T09:51:36","modified_gmt":"2025-02-05T06:51:36","slug":"livin-la-griva-loca","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/penna.cydialogue.org\/livin-la-griva-loca\/","title":{"rendered":"LIVIN’ LA GRIVA LOCA"},"content":{"rendered":"
\u201c<\/strong>How dare they call the hero Dhigenis a traitor?\u201d<\/strong> The<\/strong> enraged telephone call received by \u2018Politis\u2019 in today\u2019s radio broadcast \u2018Animeros Politis\u2019, simply serves to confirm the futility of the logic that characterises any discussion around the destroyer of Cyprus. The truth is that I have said much worse things about Grivas (such as that the place he deserves is in the toilet of history), however it is the betrayal of our country by a supposed super-patriot that hurts more. Even<\/strong> if<\/strong> his<\/strong> remaining<\/strong> unrepentant<\/strong> followers are still living in denial. <\/strong><\/p>\n If someone had fallen into a coma sometime in the early \u201870s and awoken in 2025, and switched on their television theywould experience the surrealistic Cypriot version of\u00a0Goodbye<\/em> Lenin<\/em>\u00a0where Makarios and Grivas still monopolise all political discussions. Even though certain voices are heard speaking out against this talk that is embedded in the past, the truth is that anyone who speaks in general terms and does not clearly decry the exhumation of Grivas by DISY for micro-political reasons, is not really interested in bringing the discussion into the 21st<\/sup> century, but instead wishes to take it as far away as possible from the founder of EOKA B-idiots. In fact, keeping equal distances, saying yes but\u2026 and talking about grey areas, always favours blackness. Clearly<\/em>, as the President might say (he cleaned up the mess this year by sending to Grivas\u2019s memorial the government liaison officer with the far right Immigration Minister \u2013 he wasn\u2019t going to just sit there and fret!).<\/p>\n Whoever actually believed that DISY as it is today would not have been present at this year\u2019s memorial service for Grivas, probably has no contact with reality. With the steady hemorrhaging of voters towards the rising and normalized extreme right \u2013 following the domination of Trumpism (and let us not forget that they were raised by the two former leaders of the party), we should be thankful that they were merely present at the memorial and did not stage \u2013 I don\u2019t know \u2013 \u2018Grivas Dhigenis: The Musical\u201d in his honour. Yes, they are that<\/em> desperate. Appealing to the lowest instincts of your most extreme and marginalised audience out of fear that they might move towards ELAM, is the lowest and cheapest kind of politics \u2013 as if there is any other on the island that we don\u2019t know about. The turn to the far right by DISY based on the reasoning we-cannot-lose-our-position-as-number-one-party no matter what, is now officially a fact (besides, it all began with Pelekanos-in-Pelekanos\u2019s-place Deputy Chair Karousos) and let us hope things are not made worse by (yet another) haunting by Grivas.<\/p>\n Flirting with the past mainly benefits the two largest parties which unfortunately still represent the two dominantideologies, albeit in their sclerotic, arid and obsolete positioning (Right and Left. Whereas in most western countries these have evolved and been updated, in Cyprus they still continue with the mind-set and rhetoric of the Cold War days. DISY uses Grivas and other fossils in order to rally the patriotic right while AKEL uses him as the bogeyman for any democratic, liberal citizen outside AKEL who might consider flirting with him. They are not wrong. A few sporadic progressive flashes by DISY might trick you for a while until events like the Grivas memorial bring you back to the brutal reality of a DISY dancing clumsily while ELAM shakes the tambourine. For this is where the supposed modernising, European leading<\/em>-DISY party has come to: a constant pissing contest with ELAM as to whose is bigger. Patriotism. Glafcos (Clerides) is not just turning in his grave, he is doing a break-dance! Unfortunately as tragic as is the comedown of DISY, equally tragicomic is the obsessive triggering of AKEL to any mention of Grivas You see, it is no longer enough for them to point out to us in a didactic manner how trapped in the past DISY is, but how much they have escaped their own trap. And it is here of course that they are both roundly defeated. Obsession with the past is a two-way street and each of them has taken a lane and is racing in reverse.<\/p>\n In conclusion, as long as demand continues, the two largest parties will preserve the corpses of the past in formalin and parade them like the remains of saints to be worshipped. History is there- it is taught, studied, analysed, it cannot be counterfeited or deleted. But we are in deep trouble if every single<\/em> bloody discussion of today will be monopolised for the next fifty years!!<\/p>\n This article was originally published on 28.01.2025<\/em><\/p>\n