The ghost of Makarios still lives in the South

WITH the ongoing Cyprus negotiations facing impasse, it is enlightening to read the biography of Makarios, the man who almost singlehandedly created the impasse, now almost six decades old.

Stanley Mayes, an official at the Cyprus Public Information Office who personally knew the Archbishop, wrote a highly sympathetic account of the man, published originally in English in 1980.

It was expertly translated into Turkish by Önder Şeçkin and republished in 2019 by Khora Yayınları with the title: Kıbrısın İlk Cumhurbaşkanı Makarios, Yaşam Öyküsü* (KCM for short).

Over the weekend, I read Stanley Mayes’ KCM, but intensively the parts to learn what Mayes says about (a) the actions of Makarios at the London Conference, 1959 and (b) the 13 Points Ultimatum he presented to Dr Fazıl Küçük on November 30, 1963.

It was not until the very last sentence in KCM (p. 308) that Mayes admits the general opinion that Makarios was a tragic personality, who ruled the Greek Cypriots with an iron fist for 30 years, until his sudden end at 64. His tragic legacy has continued to this day.

As regards the London Conference, Mayes clearly demonstrates that Makarios was unpredictable.

He always wanted “Enosis and nothing but Enosis” and admired “Greece”. But his “Greece” was a mystical ideal.

In reality, he had a troubled relationship with the “the Hellenic Center,” understandable with the Junta (p. 243). Even with the Karamanlis government in power in Athens at the time of the London Conference, Makarios was very much his own man.

On the eve of the Cyprus Conference, after the successful Zurich Agreement between Athens and Ankara, the Archbishop phoned the Greek PM to inform him that “he will definitely accept the Zurich Agreement” (p. 152).

Once in London, however, Makarios changed his mind. Foreign Minister Averoff informed Karamanlis that Makarios “has broken his promise” (p. 155) and wanted major revisions in the Zurich Agreement.

A furious Karamanlis bluntly told Makarios that he was “kicking opportunity with his foot” the only chance he had for achieving Cyprus independence.

Ironically, a day earlier when he himself arrived in London, Makarios had phoned the British Foreign Office to state that he was ready to endorse the Zurich Agreement.

The large delegation Makarios took with him to London (which included Eoka, bishops, Left and Right representatives) was, as always, split and Makarios himself was torn which way to turn.

At the conclusion of the Conference, in a rare moment of statesmanship, he wrote a letter to Grivas, stating that “taken as a whole” and in the prevailing circumstances, “the London Agreement was the best achievable” (p. 153). Grivas was never satisfied; Makarios himself soon began to undo that very Agreement.

On the 13 Point Ultimatum, Mayes is unashamedly pro-Makarios. His treatment of the disputes over the municipalities, 30 per cent quota for Turkish Cypriots in the Civil Service, the creation of a Cyprus army, and other disagreements, all make Makarios look like a reasonable politician painfully trying to make sense out of an unworkable Constitution.

He acknowledges the notorious Akritas Plan, secretly organised and led by the Interior Minister Yorgacis, but he argues, unconvincingly, that it was meant merely “to get rid of meaningless articles of the Constitution” (p. 185).

Mayes gives more significance to High Commissioner Sir Arthur Clark’s encouragement to Makarios (p. 189) than to the sane advice from both London and Athens against his plan to change the Constitution. The obstinate Archbishop went his own way, violently destroying the partnership Republic.

Overall, this is a useful book, a sad tale about a pathetic man, a Byzantian fusion of churchman and politician, who hated the Turks, but ended up preparing the ground for two States.

The real tragedy is that Makarios’ ghost still lives in the South, fuelling discord not only between the Turks and Greeks of the island, but within the Greek Cypriot community itself who cannot forget Eoka nor give up Enosis.

* Stanley Mayes, Kıbrısın İlk Cumhurbaşkanı Başpiskopos III. Makarios Yaşam Öyküsü [The First President of Cyprus Archbishop Makarios III A Life Story], Biografi Khora Yayınları 2019, Lefkoşa

Özay Mehmet, Ph.D (Toronto), Distinguished Research Professor, International Affairs (Emeritus), Lead Scholar, Centre in Modern Turkish Studies, Norman Patterson School of International Affairs, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ont., Canada