Democratic Rally (DISY) leader Annita Demetriou on Monday denied that personal blackmail lay behind her withdrawal from the race for the party’s 2028 presidential nomination. She said she stepped aside to protect party unity, and admitted she had been hurt by the stance of former leader Averof Neofytou.
“It is not a matter of blackmail. It is a matter of political reality,” Demetriou, who is also House President, told Alpha Cyprus’s ‘Bras De Fer’ programme.
She described managing the balance of forces within DISY as a minefield, with disagreements, tensions and backstabbing. She said her decision followed an assessment of the political situation within the party. In what she called the unthinkable event that Neofytou ran for president as an independent, outside the party’s internal process, she judged that continuing her own candidacy might cause the party further problems.
Demetriou dismissed insinuations that she had been personally blackmailed in other ways as baseless and shameful, saying they were aimed at damaging her politically. “Many cannot understand and accept that a woman is in the position she is in through the votes of citizens,” she said, insisting there had been no such blackmail.
Leadership
Asked about speculation that she might step down as party leader, Demetriou asked why she should resign, since her decisions had been guided solely by the need to preserve DISY’s unity. She said she did not consider her leadership to be in question and was determined to continue. She did not rule out running for the party leadership again, saying she still had goals and plans she wanted to carry out.
2028 election
Demetriou ruled out DISY backing an AKEL candidate in the second round of the 2028 presidential election. She said she believed the party’s candidate could reach the second round, and that its campaign would be based on the party’s political programme. Referring to President Nikos Christodoulides, she said that setting the political direction of the centre-right was DISY’s own responsibility.
She said she had been hurt by Neofytou at the time, which was human and natural, and that she would have preferred direct communication to messages passed through third parties. The two had since talked and put it behind them, she said, and had good personal and political relations.
Neofytou would have her full support if he won the nomination, she said, as would Giorgos Pamborides. She added that she was convinced they would work together without difficulty if Neofytou were elected President.
Party figures
Demetriou said she had initially considered accepting the resignation of former finance minister Harris Georgiades as president of the Glafcos Clerides Institute. She and the rest of the party leadership then decided to try to smooth things over. She said she had already spoken to him by phone and that a meeting was planned. Expressing different views could not lead to party figures being shut out, she said.
She also said she had disagreed with former DISY parliamentary spokesman Nikos Tornaritis’s decision to become Special Political Envoy for the Cyprus problem in Asia and Africa. Of Tina Pavlou, who has taken up duties at the Deputy Ministry of Welfare, she said she would have expected to be informed of her decision beforehand, but wished her success.
