Tales from the Coffeeshop: Happy third birthday, Prezniktwo

PREZNIKTWO completed three years in office on Saturday, and today he enters the fourth. Only two years left for him to learn how to govern, the part of being president that he is not cut out for and obviously dislikes, as it involves taking decisions which is not his forte.

It was a pity that instead of celebrating his third anniversary he was faced with the foot and mouth disease fiasco, which reminded everyone of the ineptitude of his government. Despite being aware that the disease had hit livestock farms in occupied Kyproulla before Christmas, our authorities were still totally unprepared for the outbreak over here two months later.

And as the Prez usually does when the merde hits the fan, he goes into hiding. Since the outbreak of foot and mouth, 10 days ago, he made one brief, vacuous comment about the biggest crisis to hit livestock farming.

“We will stand, as the government, by the side of all those affected, from every point of view, I want to make this clear, we shall stand by the side of all those affected.” From the first moment, when the problem surfaced in the occupied area, specific measures were taken by the veterinary services, he added.

Thanks to these specific measures 14,000 animals were culled, and we did not have a single vaccine available to deal with the problem.

PREDICTABLY, the government immediately employed diversionary tactics to turn attention away from its ineptitude.

There were possibly, “illegal activities, which led to the very difficult situation that we have to manage today”, he said, without elaborating. He was referring to the theories about about our farmers buying infected fodder from the north. Another theory was that farmers had bought infected animals in the north.

The police were investigating to find someone to blame for the disaster and dispel any suspicion that the government’s do-nothing policy may have played a part. If the cops find who had committed the illegal activities, our establishment will set up a lynch-mob to deal with him, and apologise for bad-mouthing the government.

I reckon the person really to blame is agriculture minister Maria Panayiotou, who seems to attract misfortune like a bad charm. Since her appointment, there were the Limassol fires, the breakdown of desalination plants, the drought and now foot and mouth.

If I were the prez, I would remove her from her post to avert any future, natural or unnatural disaster.

TWO YEARS after the start of the investigation into the allegations made against Preznikone in the book Mafia State and its report is still not ready.

In an announcement issued on Thursday by the anti-corruption authority, the delay was attributed to health problems suffered by two of the four inspectors. An additional problem was that one of these inspectors got a job in the public service, but his start date was put back to May 1 so he can finish his work for the authority.

The authority claimed all findings would be completed before the end of April, and it would then prepare its conclusions without informing us when these would be made public. A report in Politis, quoting sources at the authority, suggested the release of the report would be after the parliamentary elections (May 24), so that the authority is not seen as interfering in any way in the electoral process.

As far as dumb explanations go, this is in a league of its own. In what universe would a report on the activities of a former prez, who is not even standing for election, be considered interference in parliamentary elections?

EDUCATION minister Athina Michaelidou announced a new government initiative for pre-school age kids. According to CyBC news, the ministry would be “dynamically re-introducing” the mantra “I know, I do not forget and I fight,” for four- and five-year-olds; maybe three-year-olds also.

Speaking at an anti-occupation conference on Saturday, Michaelidou said she considered it important for children who did not have the opportunity to live in the occupied areas to learn about them from their teachers.

Addressing the kids, she said, “it is important that you and every child know this piece of modern history of our country and understand how important the mindset of, ‘I do not forget, I fight’, is.” The kids forgot what Michaelidou was talking about before they even left the auditorium. I refer to the minority that might have been listening.

I AM NOT a fan of Yanis Varoufakis, the lefty economics professor and poseur, who served briefly as finance minister of Greece and is currently a party leader, but I just cannot believe what Greece’s authorities have done to him.

Varoufakis was charged for allegedly promoting drug use, after he admitted on a podcast in January that he had taken an ecstasy pill at a pop concert in Australia in 1989.

On the podcast he was asked if he took drugs and said: “I took ecstasy once. It was an amazing experience until a few days later when I had an incredible migraine…. I remember dancing for 15 to 16 hours as if nothing had happened.” He also admitted a liking for marijuana, but could not find any, which suggests he is mixing with the wrong people.

The great and the good of Greece were outraged and Varoufakis, as a role model, was charged on Wednesday with “encouraging others in the illegal use of narcotics”. His hearing will take place in December. This not about drugs but an attack on free speech, which I hope Greeks will not put up with.

OUR GOVERNMENT was careful not to take a stand on the US-Israel attack on Iran nor to say anything about the international law which it has always championed. These are the government’s two close allies, so it could not possibly condemn the attack.

Foreign Minister Constantinos Kombos, said “we are very closely monitoring the escalation of the situation in the region,” before informing us that special national plan Estia, for the evacuation of foreign nationals from Israel, had been activated.

The Prez was also closely monitoring the situation and stressed that Kyproulla, “within the boundaries of its capabilities, and its humanitarian approach will do everything it can so that this crisis is faced.” Our government does much better dealing with crises abroad than those in our country, which are just a nuisance.

AS OUR prez is celebrating his third birthday as head of state, I did not want to sign off on a sour note, without saying anything positive about him.

When it comes to opening exhibitions in Kyproulla and abroad, making speeches to conferences, seminars, business gatherings, networking with top politicians, offering solutions to world problems, talking up Kyproulla’s world importance with a straight face, he has no equal. Nobody does this better than he and he deserves our praise.

We should also give him credit for inventing the performative Cyprob process, which involves advertising your desire to secure a resumption of the talks, while doing everything you can to ensure this will never happen – like pissing off the guys who have to agree for the talks to resume.

He has done sterling performative work in this regard, even protesting about the UN putting back to July any attempt at a resumption of talks that he does not want to happen. The protest is part of the performance. 

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