The far-right party increases during the elections in Cyprus

The two largest parties in Cyprus are down by about 3 percentage points compared to the last election. Instead, the far-right National Popular Front (Elam) doubled its share of the vote to less than 6.8 percent in Sunday’s election. The anti-immigration Nationalist Party was elected to Parliament in the last elections in 2016.

Elam has its roots in the Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn, which is classified as a criminal organization in Greece and has been banned there since October of last year.

The new Center Party, Democratic Orientation (DEPA), was also strong, garnering 6.1 percent of the vote, according to him. Euronews.

Left failure

Nevertheless, the ruling right-wing Democratic Rally (DIS) was still the largest party in Cyprus, receiving 27.7 percent of the vote. The second largest party is the Communist Worker Progression Party (Akl), with about 22 percent of the vote.

It was expected that the parliamentary elections in the Greek-Cypriot part of the island would be very equal between the two largest parties, but Akl failed to challenge the current government and made one of his worst options.

– The result was not what we expected. We respect that and will carefully evaluate it, says Akl leader Andros Kipriano at the party’s vigil. Euronews.

About 65.7 percent of the 558,000 eligible voters cast their ballots, according to the news site, which was roughly in the last parliamentary elections, despite the coronavirus pandemic.

Corruption is an electoral issue

Cypriot voters had 658 candidates from 15 parties to choose from for the 56 seats in Parliament.

Corruption in the country was a crucial electoral issue:

The corruption problem benefits small parties, but it also limits the number of people who stay in their homes. Political analyst Cristoforo Cristoforo says a large portion of the electorate is dissatisfied with the incumbent parties.

However, the smaller parties failed to garner adequate support, so the country’s president, Nikos Anastasiades, who was formerly the leader of the Desi party and has been in office since 2013, can continue to rule with the help of a minority government.