Authoritarianism, left unchecked to shape the public discourse, can self-propel and legitimise itself, diverting the blame for a degraded public health system from the state onto society

Ioannou, G.

Ioannou, Gregoris

Enlighten: Publications

4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 1/12
C A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?
Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of
the Republic of Cyprus
Authoritarianism, le  unchecked to shape the public discourse, can
self-propel and legitimise itself, diverting the blame for a degraded
public health system from the state onto society.
Gregoris Ioannou
7 April 2020
DONATE
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 2/12
Twitter post by the Cyprus Police on 30/3/2020. Subsequently removed. | Screenshot.
A t the end of February, as the Covid-19 crisis developed in Europe,governments began to adopt measures which evolved by March into
various sorts of lock-down aiming to impose physical distancing between
individuals. In a context in which, after decades of neoliberal policies,
underfunding and privatisation, national public health systems lacked the
capacity to cope with the surge of demand provoked by the global pandemic,
lock-downs were deemed essential.
At the same time as a substantial part of economic activity was suspended,
governments pledged to support workers who had to abstain from work and
businesses that had to shut, including the announcement of several social policy
and temporary tax relief measures. Where adopted, lock-down measures
typically included the prohibition of congregations and restriction of non-
essential travel, granting enhanced powers to the police to enforce this where
needed. The executive authority meanwhile assumed more powers, ostensibly to
upgrade health care capacities and deal with the economic consequences mostly
via executive decrees instead of proper legislation.
This is as far as the generalisation can go. When one gets into the specifics of
each European state, significant divergences emerge not only with respect to the
timing, the scope and the details of the measures adopted but also with respect
to their focus, their direction and their logic or absence thereof. While for
example some, such as the centre-left coalition government in Spain, have
brought private hospitals under state control, others, such as the right-wing
government in Greece, paid private hospitals premium money to use their
facilities. Whereas the centre-left government in Portugal decided to give to all
migrants and asylum seekers temporary citizen rights in order to automatically
incorporate them into the social security and health care systems, in Bulgaria the
army which was given police powers by the conservative government , set up
checkpoints outside Roma neighbourhoods to control their movement.
In Bulgaria the army which was given police powers by the
conservative government, set up checkpoints outside Roma
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 3/12
neighbourhoods to control their movement.
While in some countries the emergency measures were assigned a fixed term of
weeks or months, in others this was left open for review at an unspecified date in
the future. Although violating civil liberties in unprecedented ways in peace-time
democracy, in most cases these regulations were instituted “legally”, voted in by
parliaments and following the stipulated constitutional procedures. In some east
and south European states however, such niceties were deemed unaffordable
luxuries in times of crisis.
An absent EU
The EU so far has been largely absent from the whole crisis management
operation and only came to post facto accept or turn a blind eye to the initiatives
taken by the nation-states even when these violated treaties, principles, rules and
regulations. A lot has been said about the economic consequences of the lock-
down measures and on the sealing of national borders. A lot of speculation is
also being expressed about the magnitude of the debt crisis looming ahead and
the future of the Eurozone and the EU amidst resurgent divisions and
polarisation among member-states. There is less discussion on the authoritarian
drift observed and what there is tends to focus on eastern Europe, which already
manifested authoritarian trends before the Covid-19 crisis. Hungary is the most
cited example where Orban’s government secured the power to rule by decree
without parliamentary scrutiny, and restrict free speech without an end date.
The public health system
The authoritarian measures of movement restriction are justified through a
discourse of “science”, with lock-down presented as the implementation of
physical distancing. While the example of China and the recommendations of the
World Health Organisation (WHO) are cited by European states for this, most of
them underplay or ignore the other half of the story: the rapid and massive
diversion of resources into the public health system undertaken by China and the
widespread testing of the population.
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 4/12
As the WHO tirelessly insists, “lock-down on its own cannot solve the problem”, it
seems that at least some European states are using authoritarian measures of
population control as a substitute for the needed upscaling of public health
system capacity. Through the enhanced “legitimacy” assumed as a result of the
fear that has overtaken wide sections of society and through their friendly media
some governments are able to frame the public health crisis as a public security
crisis, invoking war imagery and discourse that shifts public debate and the public
attention from state failures to “disobedient” individual citizens who need
disciplining through ever-escalating collective punitive measures. The Republic of
Cyprus is one of the most extreme examples of this in Europe and deserves to be
more closely examined.
Authoritarian Cyprus
As Covid-19 began to spread in Europe in February, the Cyprus government
initially ignored it taking no measures at all with respect to its busy airports and
making no attempt to boost the capacity of its newly instituted NHS system
(GESY) and its already crumbling public hospitals.
At the end of the month it surprised everybody by unilaterally closing 4 of the 7
crossings under its control to the northern part of the country in a nationalist and
populist move, alleging that the threat to public health came from the Turkish
Cypriot community, provoking the reaction of the peace and reunification
movement and shifting public attention away from public health to the politics of
Cyprus’ division.
Soon the nationalist political authorities in the Turkish Cypriot community
responded to the Greek Cypriot nationalist challenge by closing different
additional crossings. When the first case of Covid-19 appeared in the island
contracted by UK and German travellers, on the same day in the south and north
respectively, all the crossings between the two parts of Cyprus were blocked.
Ignoring the calls of the peace movement for cooperation and coordination
between the two sides to combat the spread of the virus, the Republic of Cyprus
oriented itself towards Greece instead which it emulated using even identical
phraseology in the instituting of lock-down measures. The Republic of Cyprus’
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 5/12
measures, however, soon came to surpass those of Greece in severity,
disproportionality as well as irrationality.
Not only did the Republic of Cyprus completely prohibit entry into Cyprus to
visitors from anywhere, it was also the only state in the world to block its own
citizens who found themselves abroad and in need of returning. After leaving
thousands of citizens stranded abroad for a week and after the public outcry this
provoked, it allowed some of them who were temporarily abroad to return and
placed them in precautionary quarantine for 14 days, claiming that this would be
extended for some other categories of Cypriots such as workers and students in
the future.
Besides closing-down non-essential industries, it also closed public parks and
made it illegal for everybody to leave their home without an “essential reason”.
Eight such “essential reasons” were listed in a print form, from which everybody
had to tick one and sign, specifying the time and presenting it to the increased
police patrols which were supplemented by army personnel.
On March 30, further restrictions were imposed, making a prior permit issued by
the police via its reply to the SMS application obligatory to every person under 65
years old while only 1 exit from one’s domicile per day was allowed and none
between 21.00-6.00. A maximum of 3 persons per car was instituted and more
alarmingly it was announced that the police would check homes to see if there
were persons inside there other than the home residents. After the public outcry
that this provoked, the government retreated clarifying that this would only be
done either with consent or a court warrant.
No mere incompetence
While incompetence can take us some way in accounting for the rushed,
disproportionate and irrational measures adopted by Anastasiades’ government,
the picture cannot be completed unless the chronic inefficiency of the Republic
of Cyprus as a state is accounted for as well, and the condition of its public health
system more specifically.
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 6/12
While in 1990 there was one hospital bed per 170 persons, in 2017 the
underfunding of health led this to shrink to one bed per 290 persons. With an EU
average of 541 hospital beds per 100 000 residents, Cyprus has 339. Long-term
health care expenditure in many EU countries surpasses 20% of their total health
spending, while in Cyprus the equivalent figure is 3%. At an EU average of total
health spending of 10% of GDP, in Cyprus this stands at merely 6.8%.
Covid-19 found the Cyprus health system totally unprepared, lacking intensive
care units and critical care physicians, lacking equipment and even protective
equipment and disposables. In the first week, three of the country’s five main
public hospitals had to close entire sections as numerous health professionals
became infected with Covid-19, testing was limited to only a few hundred per day
until the end of March and there was no new hiring of health professionals to
staff the already understaffed hospitals. The government restricted itself to the
use of medical and nursing students and no significant effort was made to divert
funds to public health.
The government restricted itself to the use of medical and nursing
students and no significant effort was made to divert funds to public
health.
Instead it immersed itself in a fully-fledged public relations battle with ministers
constantly accusing “irresponsible” citizens and threatening yet further, more
severe measures in its attempt to communicate an image of strength and
decisiveness.
This image, besides shielding it from being held accountable for the sorry state of
the public health system, also constructs a public enemy discourse which
operates as a justification for its authoritarian drift. The Attorney General and the
Head of the Law Association, while indirectly admitting when asked that the legal
and constitutional basis for these governmental decrees in the absence of a
formal declaration of a “state of emergency” is at best questionable, at the same
time attempted to silence objections and postpone such constitutionality
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 7/12
time attempted to silence objections and postpone such constitutionality
discussions for a future time “when there will be the luxury of time to make safe
judgements”.
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 8/12
“We are on duty. You are in the house. We are breaking the transmission chain of Covid-19. #We stay at
home” | Screenshot: Twitter: official account of the Cyprus Police, March 30, 2020.
This is a screen shot of the official twitter account of Cyprus Police on 30/3/2020
after the stricter lock-down measures were announced by the government. It was
removed 3 hours later after a public outcry on social media. It was also
discovered that the drawing was copied from another pre existing graphic signed
4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 9/12
discovered that the drawing was copied from another pre-existing graphic signed
by ‘Miss Matured’ without attributing credit and thus possibly also infringing
copyright law.
It is in such a context that the Minister of Interior of the Republic of Cyprus stated
on television that “time will tell whether such measures are legal or not” and that
the government establishes “new administrative structures and measures that
are at the frontier of the law”. It is in such a context that the Police of Cyprus
published the unacceptable image above in its March 30 tweet which in all its
crudeness illustrates quite aptly how it imagines its role.
Although there has been some reaction to the police-state image communicated
by the government, forcing it to a retreat, at least at the rhetorical level it remains
to be seen whether the progressive section of society and the parliamentary
opposition parties will continue to more or less tolerate the authoritarian drift
operating as a cover for incompetence and public health system degradation or
whether they will stand up to it, set limits to governmental arbitrariness, and hold
it to account.
Returning to the bigger European picture, although Cyprus might be an extreme
case, it does raise wider issues as to how authoritarianism may mask institutional
failures diverting resources and attention from public health into police
operations and substituting citizen for government responsibility. More
importantly if authoritarianism is left unchecked to shape the public discourse, it
can self-propel and legitimise itself, diverting the blame from the state onto
society.
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4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 10/12
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4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracy
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English

Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus

White Rose Research Online

This is a repository copy of Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus.White Rose Research Online URL for this paper:https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/179581/Version: Published VersionArticle:Ioannou, G. orcid.org/0000-0003-3837-4721 (2020) Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus. openDemocracy. eprints@whiterose.ac.ukhttps://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/Reuse This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) licence. This licence allows you to remix, tweak, and build upon this work non-commercially, and any new works must also acknowledge the authors and be non-commercial. You don’t have to license any derivative works on the same terms. More information and the full terms of the licence here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ Takedown If you consider content in White Rose Research Online to be in breach of UK law, please notify us by emailing eprints@whiterose.ac.uk including the URL of the record and the reason for the withdrawal request. 26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 1/15C A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case ofthe Republic of CyprusAuthoritarianism, le  unchecked to shape the public discourse, canself-propel and legitimise itself, diverting the blame for a degradedpublic health system from the state onto society.Gregoris Ioannou7 April 2020, 11.49amDONATE26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 2/15Twitter post by the Cyprus Police on 30/3/2020. Subsequently removed. | Screenshot.At the end of February, as the Covid-19 crisis developed in Europe,governments began to adopt measures which evolved by March into varioussorts of lock-down aiming to impose physical distancing between individuals. In acontext in which, after decades of neoliberal policies, underfunding andprivatisation, national public health systems lacked the capacity to cope with thesurge of demand provoked by the global pandemic, lock-downs were deemedessential.At the same time as a substantial part of economic activity was suspended,governments pledged to support workers who had to abstain from work andbusinesses that had to shut, including the announcement of several social policyand temporary tax relief measures. Where adopted, lock-down measures typicallyincluded the prohibition of congregations and restriction of non-essential travel,granting enhanced powers to the police to enforce this where needed. Theexecutive authority meanwhile assumed more powers, ostensibly to upgradehealth care capacities and deal with the economic consequences mostly viaexecutive decrees instead of proper legislation.This is as far as the generalisation can go. When one gets into the speci cs of eachEuropean state, signi cant divergences emerge not only with respect to the timing,the scope and the details of the measures adopted but also with respect to theirfocus, their direction and their logic or absence thereof. While for example some,such as the centre-left coalition government in Spain, have brought privatehospitals under state control, others, such as the right-wing government in Greece,paid private hospitals premium money to use their facilities. Whereas the centre-left government in Portugal decided to give to all migrants and asylum seekerstemporary citizen rights in order to automatically incorporate them into the socialsecurity and health care systems, in Bulgaria the army which was given policepowers by the conservative government , set up checkpoints outside Romaneighbourhoods to control their movement.26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 3/15In Bulgaria the army which was given police powers by theconservative government, set up checkpoints outside Romaneighbourhoods to control their movement.While in some countries the emergency measures were assigned a  xed term ofweeks or months, in others this was left open for review at an unspeci ed date inthe future. Although violating civil liberties in unprecedented ways in peace-timedemocracy, in most cases these regulations were instituted “legally”, voted in byparliaments and following the stipulated constitutional procedures. In some eastand south European states however, such niceties were deemed una ordableluxuries in times of crisis.An absent EUThe EU so far has been largely absent from the whole crisis managementoperation and only came to post facto accept or turn a blind eye to the initiativestaken by the nation-states even when these violated treaties, principles, rules andregulations. A lot has been said about the economic consequences of the lock-down measures and on the sealing of national borders. A lot of speculation is alsobeing expressed about the magnitude of the debt crisis looming ahead and thefuture of the Eurozone and the EU amidst resurgent divisions and polarisationamong member-states. There is less discussion on the authoritarian drift observedand what there is tends to focus on eastern Europe, which already manifestedauthoritarian trends before the Covid-19 crisis. Hungary is the most cited examplewhere Orban’s government secured the power to rule by decree withoutparliamentary scrutiny, and restrict free speech without an end date.The public health systemThe authoritarian measures of movement restriction are justi ed through adiscourse of “science”, with lock-down presented as the implementation of physicaldistancing. While the example of China and the recommendations of the WorldHealth Organisation (WHO) are cited by European states for this, most of themunderplay or ignore the other half of the story: the rapid and massive diversion of26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 4/15resources into the public health system undertaken by China and the widespreadtesting of the population.As the WHO tirelessly insists, “lock-down on its own cannot solve the problem”, itseems that at least some European states are using authoritarian measures ofpopulation control as a substitute for the needed upscaling of public health systemcapacity. Through the enhanced “legitimacy” assumed as a result of the fear thathas overtaken wide sections of society and through their friendly media somegovernments are able to frame the public health crisis as a public security crisis,invoking war imagery and discourse that shifts public debate and the publicattention from state failures to “disobedient” individual citizens who needdisciplining through ever-escalating collective punitive measures. The Republic ofCyprus is one of the most extreme examples of this in Europe and deserves to bemore closely examined.Authoritarian CyprusAs Covid-19 began to spread in Europe in February, the Cyprus government initiallyignored it taking no measures at all with respect to its busy airports and making noattempt to boost the capacity of its newly instituted NHS system (GESY) and itsalready crumbling public hospitals.At the end of the month it surprised everybody by unilaterally closing 4 of the 7crossings under its control to the northern part of the country in a nationalist andpopulist move, alleging that the threat to public health came from the TurkishCypriot community, provoking the reaction of the peace and reuni cationmovement and shifting public attention away from public health to the politics ofCyprus’ division.Soon the nationalist political authorities in the Turkish Cypriot communityresponded to the Greek Cypriot nationalist challenge by closing di erent additionalcrossings. When the  rst case of Covid-19 appeared in the island contracted by UKand German travellers, on the same day in the south and north respectively, all thecrossings between the two parts of Cyprus were blocked. Ignoring the calls of thepeace movement for cooperation and coordination between the two sides tocombat the spread of the virus, the Republic of Cyprus oriented itself towards26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 5/15Greece instead which it emulated using even identical phraseology in theinstituting of lock-down measures. The Republic of Cyprus’ measures, however,soon came to surpass those of Greece in severity, disproportionality as well asirrationality.Not only did the Republic of Cyprus completely prohibit entry into Cyprus tovisitors from anywhere, it was also the only state in the world to block its owncitizens who found themselves abroad and in need of returning. After leavingthousands of citizens stranded abroad for a week and after the public outcry thisprovoked, it allowed some of them who were temporarily abroad to return andplaced them in precautionary quarantine for 14 days, claiming that this would beextended for some other categories of Cypriots such as workers and students inthe future.Besides closing-down non-essential industries, it also closed public parks andmade it illegal for everybody to leave their home without an “essential reason”.Eight such “essential reasons” were listed in a print form, from which everybodyhad to tick one and sign, specifying the time and presenting it to the increasedpolice patrols which were supplemented by army personnel.On March 30, further restrictions were imposed, making a prior permit issued bythe police via its reply to the SMS application obligatory to every person under 65years old while only 1 exit from one’s domicile per day was allowed and nonebetween 21.00-6.00. A maximum of 3 persons per car was instituted and morealarmingly it was announced that the police would check homes to see if therewere persons inside there other than the home residents. After the public outcrythat this provoked, the government retreated clarifying that this would only bedone either with consent or a court warrant.No mere incompetenceWhile incompetence can take us some way in accounting for the rushed,disproportionate and irrational measures adopted by Anastasiades’ government,the picture cannot be completed unless the chronic ine ciency of the Republic ofCyprus as a state is accounted for as well, and the condition of its public healthsystem more speci cally.26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 6/15While in 1990 there was one hospital bed per 170 persons, in 2017 theunderfunding of health led this to shrink to one bed per 290 persons. With an EUaverage of 541 hospital beds per 100 000 residents, Cyprus has 339. Long-termhealth care expenditure in many EU countries surpasses 20% of their total healthspending, while in Cyprus the equivalent  gure is 3%. At an EU average of totalhealth spending of 10% of GDP, in Cyprus this stands at merely 6.8%.Covid-19 found the Cyprus health system totally unprepared, lacking intensive careunits and critical care physicians, lacking equipment and even protectiveequipment and disposables. In the  rst week, three of the country’s  ve mainpublic hospitals had to close entire sections as numerous health professionalsbecame infected with Covid-19, testing was limited to only a few hundred per dayuntil the end of March and there was no new hiring of health professionals to sta the already understa ed hospitals. The government restricted itself to the use ofmedical and nursing students and no signi cant e ort was made to divert funds topublic health.The government restricted itself to the use of medical and nursingstudents and no signi cant e ort was made to divert funds to publichealth.Instead it immersed itself in a fully- edged public relations battle with ministersconstantly accusing “irresponsible” citizens and threatening yet further, moresevere measures in its attempt to communicate an image of strength anddecisiveness.This image, besides shielding it from being held accountable for the sorry state ofthe public health system, also constructs a public enemy discourse which operatesas a justi cation for its authoritarian drift. The Attorney General and the Head ofthe Law Association, while indirectly admitting when asked that the legal andconstitutional basis for these governmental decrees in the absence of a formaldeclaration of a “state of emergency” is at best questionable, at the same timeattempted to silence objections and postpone such constitutionality discussionsfor a future time “when there will be the luxury of time to make safe judgements”.26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 7/15“We are on duty. You are in the house. We are breaking the transmission chain of Covid-19. #We stay athome” | Screenshot: Twitter: o cial account of the Cyprus Police, March 30, 2020.This is a screen shot of the o cial twitter account of Cyprus Police on 30/3/2020 afterthe stricter lock-down measures were announced by the government. It was removed 326/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 8/15hours later after a public outcry on social media. It was also discovered that thedrawing was copied from another pre-existing graphic signed by ‘Miss Matured’ withoutattributing credit and thus possibly also infringing copyright law.It is in such a context that the Minister of Interior of the Republic of Cyprus statedon television that “time will tell whether such measures are legal or not” and thatthe government establishes “new administrative structures and measures that areat the frontier of the law”. It is in such a context that the Police of Cyprus publishedthe unacceptable image above in its March 30 tweet which in all its crudenessillustrates quite aptly how it imagines its role.Although there has been some reaction to the police-state image communicatedby the government, forcing it to a retreat, at least at the rhetorical level it remainsto be seen whether the progressive section of society and the parliamentaryopposition parties will continue to more or less tolerate the authoritarian driftoperating as a cover for incompetence and public health system degradation orwhether they will stand up to it, set limits to governmental arbitrariness, and holdit to account.Returning to the bigger European picture, although Cyprus might be an extremecase, it does raise wider issues as to how authoritarianism may mask institutionalfailures diverting resources and attention from public health into police operationsand substituting citizen for government responsibility. More importantly ifauthoritarianism is left unchecked to shape the public discourse, it can self-propeland legitimise itself, diverting the blame from the state onto society.Empower and protect, don’t prohibit:a better approach to child workBans on child labour don’t work because they ignore why children work inthe  rst place. That is why the International Year for the Elimination of ChildLabour will fail.If we truly care about working children, we need to start trying to keep themsafe in work rather than insisting that they end work entirely. Our panelists,26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 9/15all advocates for child workers, o er us a new way forward.Join us for this free live event at 5pm UK time on Thursday 28 October.SIGN UP HERERead more26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 10/15C A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?The rationality paradoxChristos TombrasC A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?The tale of Maglaj: a story of war and peace26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 11/15Ian BancroftC A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?On immigration, Britain’s Tories sound a lot like the Italian farRightHsiao-Hung Pai26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 12/15C A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Dominic Raab didn’t anticipate Kabul falling. He should havebought some binocularsIain Galbraith26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 13/15VIEW ALL IN CAN EUROPE MAKE IT?Get weekly updates on EuropeA thoughtful weekly email of economic,political, social and cultural developmentsfrom the storm-tossed continent.Join the conversation: get our weekly emailCommentsEmail addressFirst name (optional)Last name (optional)→26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 14/15We encourage anyone to comment, please consult the oD commenting guidelines if youhave any questions.RelatedC O R O N A V I R U S C Y P R U S E C O N O M I C S E U R O P E H E A L T H  &  C A R EM E D I A  &  C O M M U N I C A T I O N S M I G R A T I O N P O L I T I C S  &  A C T I V I S MR A C I S M  &  X E N O P H O B I AThis article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. If you have anyqueries about republishing please contact us. Please check individual images for licensing details.Comments for this thread are now closed ×0 Comments openDemocracy 🔒 Disqus' Privacy Policy 1 Logint Tweet f Share Sort by OldestThis discussion has been closed.Subscribe✉ Add Disqus to your siteAdd DisqusAddd Do Not Sell My Data⚠ Favorite26/10/2021, 11:44 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 15/15All our projects© openDemocracy 2021AboutPeopleContactWrite for usJobsPrivacy noticeLog in

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4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 1/12C A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case ofthe Republic of CyprusAuthoritarianism, le  unchecked to shape the public discourse, canself-propel and legitimise itself, diverting the blame for a degradedpublic health system from the state onto society.Gregoris Ioannou7 April 2020DONATE4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 2/12Twitter post by the Cyprus Police on 30/3/2020. Subsequently removed. | Screenshot.A t the end of February, as the Covid-19 crisis developed in Europe,governments began to adopt measures which evolved by March intovarious sorts of lock-down aiming to impose physical distancing betweenindividuals. In a context in which, after decades of neoliberal policies,underfunding and privatisation, national public health systems lacked thecapacity to cope with the surge of demand provoked by the global pandemic,lock-downs were deemed essential.At the same time as a substantial part of economic activity was suspended,governments pledged to support workers who had to abstain from work andbusinesses that had to shut, including the announcement of several social policyand temporary tax relief measures. Where adopted, lock-down measurestypically included the prohibition of congregations and restriction of non-essential travel, granting enhanced powers to the police to enforce this whereneeded. The executive authority meanwhile assumed more powers, ostensibly toupgrade health care capacities and deal with the economic consequences mostlyvia executive decrees instead of proper legislation.This is as far as the generalisation can go. When one gets into the specifics ofeach European state, significant divergences emerge not only with respect to thetiming, the scope and the details of the measures adopted but also with respectto their focus, their direction and their logic or absence thereof. While forexample some, such as the centre-left coalition government in Spain, havebrought private hospitals under state control, others, such as the right-winggovernment in Greece, paid private hospitals premium money to use theirfacilities. Whereas the centre-left government in Portugal decided to give to allmigrants and asylum seekers temporary citizen rights in order to automaticallyincorporate them into the social security and health care systems, in Bulgaria thearmy which was given police powers by the conservative government , set upcheckpoints outside Roma neighbourhoods to control their movement.In Bulgaria the army which was given police powers by theconservative government, set up checkpoints outside Roma4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 3/12neighbourhoods to control their movement.While in some countries the emergency measures were assigned a fixed term ofweeks or months, in others this was left open for review at an unspecified date inthe future. Although violating civil liberties in unprecedented ways in peace-timedemocracy, in most cases these regulations were instituted “legally”, voted in byparliaments and following the stipulated constitutional procedures. In some eastand south European states however, such niceties were deemed unaffordableluxuries in times of crisis.An absent EUThe EU so far has been largely absent from the whole crisis managementoperation and only came to post facto accept or turn a blind eye to the initiativestaken by the nation-states even when these violated treaties, principles, rules andregulations. A lot has been said about the economic consequences of the lock-down measures and on the sealing of national borders. A lot of speculation isalso being expressed about the magnitude of the debt crisis looming ahead andthe future of the Eurozone and the EU amidst resurgent divisions andpolarisation among member-states. There is less discussion on the authoritariandrift observed and what there is tends to focus on eastern Europe, which alreadymanifested authoritarian trends before the Covid-19 crisis. Hungary is the mostcited example where Orban’s government secured the power to rule by decreewithout parliamentary scrutiny, and restrict free speech without an end date.The public health systemThe authoritarian measures of movement restriction are justified through adiscourse of “science”, with lock-down presented as the implementation ofphysical distancing. While the example of China and the recommendations of theWorld Health Organisation (WHO) are cited by European states for this, most ofthem underplay or ignore the other half of the story: the rapid and massivediversion of resources into the public health system undertaken by China and thewidespread testing of the population.4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 4/12As the WHO tirelessly insists, “lock-down on its own cannot solve the problem”, itseems that at least some European states are using authoritarian measures ofpopulation control as a substitute for the needed upscaling of public healthsystem capacity. Through the enhanced “legitimacy” assumed as a result of thefear that has overtaken wide sections of society and through their friendly mediasome governments are able to frame the public health crisis as a public securitycrisis, invoking war imagery and discourse that shifts public debate and the publicattention from state failures to “disobedient” individual citizens who needdisciplining through ever-escalating collective punitive measures. The Republic ofCyprus is one of the most extreme examples of this in Europe and deserves to bemore closely examined.Authoritarian CyprusAs Covid-19 began to spread in Europe in February, the Cyprus governmentinitially ignored it taking no measures at all with respect to its busy airports andmaking no attempt to boost the capacity of its newly instituted NHS system(GESY) and its already crumbling public hospitals.At the end of the month it surprised everybody by unilaterally closing 4 of the 7crossings under its control to the northern part of the country in a nationalist andpopulist move, alleging that the threat to public health came from the TurkishCypriot community, provoking the reaction of the peace and reunificationmovement and shifting public attention away from public health to the politics ofCyprus’ division.Soon the nationalist political authorities in the Turkish Cypriot communityresponded to the Greek Cypriot nationalist challenge by closing differentadditional crossings. When the first case of Covid-19 appeared in the islandcontracted by UK and German travellers, on the same day in the south and northrespectively, all the crossings between the two parts of Cyprus were blocked.Ignoring the calls of the peace movement for cooperation and coordinationbetween the two sides to combat the spread of the virus, the Republic of Cyprusoriented itself towards Greece instead which it emulated using even identicalphraseology in the instituting of lock-down measures. The Republic of Cyprus’4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 5/12measures, however, soon came to surpass those of Greece in severity,disproportionality as well as irrationality.Not only did the Republic of Cyprus completely prohibit entry into Cyprus tovisitors from anywhere, it was also the only state in the world to block its owncitizens who found themselves abroad and in need of returning. After leavingthousands of citizens stranded abroad for a week and after the public outcry thisprovoked, it allowed some of them who were temporarily abroad to return andplaced them in precautionary quarantine for 14 days, claiming that this would beextended for some other categories of Cypriots such as workers and students inthe future.Besides closing-down non-essential industries, it also closed public parks andmade it illegal for everybody to leave their home without an “essential reason”.Eight such “essential reasons” were listed in a print form, from which everybodyhad to tick one and sign, specifying the time and presenting it to the increasedpolice patrols which were supplemented by army personnel.On March 30, further restrictions were imposed, making a prior permit issued bythe police via its reply to the SMS application obligatory to every person under 65years old while only 1 exit from one’s domicile per day was allowed and nonebetween 21.00-6.00. A maximum of 3 persons per car was instituted and morealarmingly it was announced that the police would check homes to see if therewere persons inside there other than the home residents. After the public outcrythat this provoked, the government retreated clarifying that this would only bedone either with consent or a court warrant.No mere incompetenceWhile incompetence can take us some way in accounting for the rushed,disproportionate and irrational measures adopted by Anastasiades’ government,the picture cannot be completed unless the chronic inefficiency of the Republicof Cyprus as a state is accounted for as well, and the condition of its public healthsystem more specifically.4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 6/12While in 1990 there was one hospital bed per 170 persons, in 2017 theunderfunding of health led this to shrink to one bed per 290 persons. With an EUaverage of 541 hospital beds per 100 000 residents, Cyprus has 339. Long-termhealth care expenditure in many EU countries surpasses 20% of their total healthspending, while in Cyprus the equivalent figure is 3%. At an EU average of totalhealth spending of 10% of GDP, in Cyprus this stands at merely 6.8%.Covid-19 found the Cyprus health system totally unprepared, lacking intensivecare units and critical care physicians, lacking equipment and even protectiveequipment and disposables. In the first week, three of the country’s five mainpublic hospitals had to close entire sections as numerous health professionalsbecame infected with Covid-19, testing was limited to only a few hundred per dayuntil the end of March and there was no new hiring of health professionals tostaff the already understaffed hospitals. The government restricted itself to theuse of medical and nursing students and no significant effort was made to divertfunds to public health.The government restricted itself to the use of medical and nursingstudents and no significant effort was made to divert funds to publichealth.Instead it immersed itself in a fully-fledged public relations battle with ministersconstantly accusing “irresponsible” citizens and threatening yet further, moresevere measures in its attempt to communicate an image of strength anddecisiveness.This image, besides shielding it from being held accountable for the sorry state ofthe public health system, also constructs a public enemy discourse whichoperates as a justification for its authoritarian drift. The Attorney General and theHead of the Law Association, while indirectly admitting when asked that the legaland constitutional basis for these governmental decrees in the absence of aformal declaration of a “state of emergency” is at best questionable, at the sametime attempted to silence objections and postpone such constitutionality4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 7/12time attempted to silence objections and postpone such constitutionalitydiscussions for a future time “when there will be the luxury of time to make safejudgements”.4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 8/12“We are on duty. You are in the house. We are breaking the transmission chain of Covid-19. #We stay athome” | Screenshot: Twitter: official account of the Cyprus Police, March 30, 2020.This is a screen shot of the official twitter account of Cyprus Police on 30/3/2020after the stricter lock-down measures were announced by the government. It wasremoved 3 hours later after a public outcry on social media. It was alsodiscovered that the drawing was copied from another pre existing graphic signed4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 9/12discovered that the drawing was copied from another pre-existing graphic signedby ‘Miss Matured’ without attributing credit and thus possibly also infringingcopyright law.It is in such a context that the Minister of Interior of the Republic of Cyprus statedon television that “time will tell whether such measures are legal or not” and thatthe government establishes “new administrative structures and measures thatare at the frontier of the law”. It is in such a context that the Police of Cypruspublished the unacceptable image above in its March 30 tweet which in all itscrudeness illustrates quite aptly how it imagines its role.Although there has been some reaction to the police-state image communicatedby the government, forcing it to a retreat, at least at the rhetorical level it remainsto be seen whether the progressive section of society and the parliamentaryopposition parties will continue to more or less tolerate the authoritarian driftoperating as a cover for incompetence and public health system degradation orwhether they will stand up to it, set limits to governmental arbitrariness, and holdit to account.Returning to the bigger European picture, although Cyprus might be an extremecase, it does raise wider issues as to how authoritarianism may mask institutionalfailures diverting resources and attention from public health into policeoperations and substituting citizen for government responsibility. Moreimportantly if authoritarianism is left unchecked to shape the public discourse, itcan self-propel and legitimise itself, diverting the blame from the state ontosociety.Share this4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 10/12Read moreC A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Locking up dissidents,Turkish style: the saga of Osman KavalaMerve TahirogluC A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Coronavirus and everyday lifeFirat M. HaciahmetogluC A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Life vs Profit: the real ‘war’ in times of coronavirusMarina Calculli4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 11/12C A N  E U R O P E  M A K E  I T ?Europe’s lost directionMatteo Lucchese Mario PiantaVIEW ALL IN CAN EUROPE MAKE IT?Get weekly updates on EuropeA thoughtful weekly email of economic,political, social and cultural developmentsfrom the storm-tossed continent.Join the conversation: get our weekly emailCommentsWe  e n c o u r a g e  a nyo n e  t o  c o m m e n t ,  p l e a s e  c o n s u l t  the oD commenting guidelinesi f  yo u  h ave  a ny  q u e s t i o n s .Email addressFirst name (optional)Last name (optional) →4/15/2020 Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus | openDemocracyhttps://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/authoritarianism-masking-incompetence-case-republic-cyprus/ 12/12RelatedC Y P R U S  C O R O N AV I R U S  E C O N O M I C S  E U R O P E  H E A L T H  &  C A R EM E D I A  &  C O M M U N I C AT I O N S  M I G R AT I O N  P O L I T I C S  &  A C T I V I S MR A C I S M  &  X E N O P H O B I AThis article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Internationallicence. If you have any queries about republishing please contact us. Please check individual images forlicensing details.All our projects© openDemocracy 2020AboutPeopleContactWrite for usJobsPrivacy noticeLog in0 Comments openDemocracy 🔒 Disqus' Privacy Policy Login1t Tweet f Share Sort by OldestLOG IN WITH OR SIGN UP WITH DISQUS NameStart the discussion…?Be the first to comment.Subscribe✉ Add Disqus to your siteAdd DisqusAddd Do Not Sell My Data⚠ Recommend

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Authoritarianism masking incompetence? The case of the Republic of Cyprus

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