President Mustafa Akinci’s remarks regarding the development of more independence for the TRNC from Turkey continue to echo.
Akinci said that he wanted the TRNC to have a more equal relations with Turkey and move away from the Turkish motherland relationship. Incensed, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan asked if Akinci could hear himself and said that the traditional matriarchal relationship would continue, “Even working together as brothers has its conditions. We paid a price for northern Cyprus. We gave martyrs and we continue to pay a price,” Erdogan said on Monday. “For Turkey, northern Cyprus is our baby. We will continue to look at it the way a mother looks at her baby,” he added.
‘Yeni Bakis’ reports that Erdogan did not ease up on the subject when questioned by the press on his return from Kuwait. He said that the “TRNC President will not carry on according to his own interpretations”, adding that he wishes that they could agree, but because there are the guarantor countries to consider, this agreement cannot be made on their own.
Erdogan also said that they support the TRNC and that “These issues are not matters that will be agreed without being discussed first with these guarantor countries. The esteemed president will not do this work in his own way. There is no distress since the rights of our Cyprus citizens are protected”.
According to ‘Kibris Postasi’ AKP representative and Turkish National Assembly Constitutional Commission president Prof. Dr Burhan Kuzu, speaking on a Turkish TV programme recently, strongly criticised the newly elected Turkish Cypriot president.
Kuzu commented that Erdogan should have said a lot more to Akinci, asking: “On what Akinci was relying and was he trying to pick a fight?” He also said that if Akinci liked the Greek Cypriots so much then he should go and live there.
Kuzu said a person should know his place; however Turkey will not come to Cyprus to tell Akinci what to do.
Turkish Cypriot daily ‘Afrika’ reported that in response, President Akinci said that Kuzu’s statements and the language he used against him were “rude, in poor taste and an insult not only to him but also the Turkish Cypriots”.
According to Akinci’s statement, the Turkish Cypriots voted for him for his vision and his personality and everyone must respect their political will.
It also added that a TRNC which is able to stand on its own two feet would be in a more healthy position within a federal Cyprus and the EU.
Yeni Bakis, Kibris Postasi, Afrika
