By George Koumoulli
The banner “Long live the captain Grivas”, displayed by the fans of “Ethnikos” Achna in the Cyprus Cup final against Omonia on the 25th of last month, undoubtedly caused anger and frustration among the progressive citizens of the CCT.
The policy of Ethnikos Achna to praise and honor a man who contributed greatly to the refugeeization of their village “exceeds the deliberate”, our refugees say. It declares an association that has chosen situations and paths that led to negative consequences not only for Cyprus, but also for itself. A club that seems to be its greatest enemy is itself. This tendency is called by psychiatrists as a self-defeating personality disorder. It is as if the turkeys are parading with huge banners with the slogan “I ASK FOR CHRISTMAS”.
On the other hand, however, I wonder if the heroization of Grivas should really cause anger and/or surprise when:
- The current leader of DISY attends every year the memorial service of Grivas and deposits a wreath
- The Minister of Education stands in a posture of attention in front of the statue of the leader of the criminal EOKA II
- Right-wing parties and organizations canonize Grivas
- The Parliament approves expenses for the maintenance of the monument of Grivas.
But this is not just a political issue. The issue is primarily a moral one but, strangely enough (;), this aspect of the Drama of Cyprus has not preoccupied us at all. It does not concern those who sing to the Left, but all of us. Why, however, is this reluctance to dwell on this issue? out of fear or out of shame.”
Grivas, as the leader of the criminal organization EOKA II, was the instigator of many murders. And it wasn’t just the murders of people with left-wing opinions. Several right-wingers were killed because they dared to disagree with the action of EOKA B’, such as Stelios Mavros, a fighter of EOKA and a prominent member of the Unified Party, that is, the then right-wing faction. According to the Committee for the Establishment and Maintenance of a Register of Resistance Fighters, twice Stelios Mavros “had carried on his shoulders Grivas, who was ill, in hideouts located in inaccessible areas. Stelios Mavros, due to his physique and the excellent knowledge of his area, had undertaken the transfer of G. Grivas to the doctor, saving his life, since the one time he had undergone surgery and the removal of appendicitis” (See https://antistasi1974.com/heroes/ mauros-stelios/).
It is this heinous crime that shows how ungrateful Grivas was, that Glafkos Clerides enraged said in January 1974: “I will call on the Parliament and the people to condemn Grivas as a common murderer.” Unfortunately, two days after this statement Grivas died of a heart attack, probably from his colossal humiliation that would follow. How, then, is it possible for the State and the Church to canonize someone who was a serial violator of the 6th commandment? Does the commandment “Thou shalt not kill” have asterisks and we do not know it? Or have we reached the last rung of moral downfall and didn’t take it lightly? Or is it that the smelly eczema of fascism that is on the skin of some is impossible to combat? These are questions that the Cypriot public avoids dealing with for the reasons explained by Hypereides.
An additional problem (but inherent and characteristic) in this hot topic is the penetration of ELAM into the “nationalist” clubs through the “organized” supporters with the tolerance, unfortunately, of the council administrators. There is no doubt that if only young people aged 15 to 18 voted in the parliamentary elections, ELAM would get at least 70% of the votes. If one manages to talk to them, one will verify that these young people believe that the solution to the Cyprus problem is union.
The Cypriot flag is reviled and those who espouse the symbols of the CCT are “anti-Greek”. In all international matches, the fans of these teams display Greek flags, conveying Turkey’s cherished message to the whole world via television that the CCT is deceased. It is a Turkish propaganda worth tens of millions of euros, a gift from the “extreme Greeks” of Cyprus. In short, the “nationalist” unions of Cyprus have become fiery advocates of Erdogan without realizing it. Which is a screech! Who knows, some of Erdogan’s toasts will be in favor of the prosperity of these unions.
In conclusion, the behavior of the football “national-speaking” clubs of the cities is no different from that of the Ethnikos Achna. These unions do not have the ability to realize that in the final analysis the contempt for the symbols of the CCT undermines our state entity for the benefit of Turkey, while the recognition only of the Greek flag and the projection of slogans such as, “Cyprus is Greek”, are ultimately to the detriment of the Hellenism of Cyprus as history teaches us. To use the terminology of the “ethnophrones”, their behavior is highly anti-Greek.
*Opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of CypriumNews.
