Voting was delayed for over an hour while the focus remained on plans for a two-state solution to the Cyprus problem at the north’s largest party the UBP on Saturday.
The party’s 21,000 members had been set to elect their party’s leader and its 70-member party conference from 11am until 9am, but as 11am and then 12pm passed, the polls inside the sports hall at northern Nicosia’s fairground did not open.
Despite this, thousands of party members were waiting both in the sports hall itself and in the corridors of the building, with the delays causing tensions to rise and arguments and even physical fights to break out among party members.
Some party members decided to leave rather than wait for the polls to open, while the police were called in to calm those down who had remained and expressed their displeasure at the wait.
News website Haber Kibris reported that the initial cause of tensions was related to the placing of bouncers on the sports hall’s doors.
Once voting was underway, they reported that a subsequent cause of delays and tension among party members was that voters were taking longer than usual at the ballot box as some wished to take photographs of their ballot papers or even take the ballot papers outside before returning to deposit them.
The party decided given the circumstances to delay the time at which the polls will close from 9pm until midnight. As of 9pm, a total of 8,449 party members had cast a vote.
Party leadership candidate Hasan Tacoy expressed his frustration at the sequence of events, saying, “unfortunately, the voting process was disrupted to the chaos created by inexperience and incompetence which has not been seen at previous conferences”.
He later told television channel Kanal Sim the conference had been “suspicious”, that the election’s result “would not be healthy due to irregularities”, and that his team had filed two separate objections
His opponent and incumbent party leader Unal Ustel chose instead to focus on the positives of the day, saying, “today, we are in a race of democracy with enthusiasm and a festive atmosphere”.
Aside from the problems with voting, one key theme of the conference was the unanimity of those present in their support for a two-state solution to the Cyprus problem.
The conference passed a resolution which read that “a fight for freedom and sovereignty is being waged” and that “the historical rights of the Turkish Cypriots and Turkey are being ignored”.
The text also condemned the “Greek Cypriot-Greek duo” for “claiming the island of Cyprus as their own”, while also saying that both the European Union and the United Nations were “giving unfair support” to that cause.
President Nikos Christodoulides was also mentioned by name in the resolution, though in the copy of the text obtained by newspaper Kibris, his name was spelt wrong and the date on which he was elected was wrong by a year.
The text claimed that “Christodouloudes” was elected in February 2022 and is “demanding that we continue the so-called federal solution from where we left off in Crans Montana in 2017”.
Current Turkish Cypriot leader and former party leader Ersin Tatar also spoke at the event, telling party members that in his current capacity, he is “making great efforts to ensure that the TRNC is recognised internationally and takes the place it deserves”.
He also criticised opposition party CTP leader Tufan Erhurman and foreign relations secretary Fikri Toros for electing to travel to New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly this coming week.
“Some are taking steps today as if they were a parallel structure, to harm national politics for their own personal gain. They are going to meet with some representatives from the socialist world. I do not know with whom. We will never accept them harming our national politics,” he said.
Erhurman and Toros had announced their intention to travel to New York on Saturday, with Toros also announcing a five-point plan to ensure that the next round of negotiations to solve the Cyprus problem produces results.
He also made no secret of the fact that the trip is being used to position Erhurman as a pro-reunification alternative to Tatar ahead of next year’s election, saying the CTP is “offering a new leader to the community” and that there is a “gap in terms of leadership”.
As well as Tatar, the conference was also attended by Turkey’s ruling AK Party’s deputy leader Efkan Ala and Azerbaijan’s ruling New Azerbaijan Party’s foreign relations chief Ramil Hasan, with both giving speeches expressing their support for a two-state solution to the Cyprus problem.
The party members’ votes will be counted from 10am on Sunday, with the election results to be announced when voting is complete.
For a full breakdown of the candidates and the campaign so far, click here.
