Greek Cypriots go to the polls on Sunday in a tight presidential election that pits the incumbent conservative, Nicos Anastasiades, against a leftist-backed academic, Stavros Malas.



Insults have intensified in the week after an inconclusive first round, and the race has boiled down to a contest over who is better equipped to reunite Cyprus and oversee an economy only now recovering from near-collapse.

Although a political neophyte by the standards of his opponent, Malas has captivated the electorate, with the geneticist winning 30.2% of the vote last Sunday. Anastasiades, who heads the centre-right Disy party, came in with 35.5%.

There has been a discernible shift in mood as supporters of Malas, an independent backed by the leftist party Akel [Progressive Party of the Working People], become more hopeful of victory.

Anastasiades, 71, credited with overseeing the island’s exit from international bailout supervision, has long been the frontrunner. But while most analysts say the election is still his to lose, his lead no longer looks unassailable.

The fact that other smaller parties – including the centrist Diko, which came in third under its nationalist leader, Nikolas Papadopoulos – have refused to endorse either candidate means the result is likely to be close.

“Malas’ unexpectedly good first round has suddenly ignited hopes among supporters that he could win,” said Hubert Faustmann, a professor of history and political science at the University of Nicosia. “It has added suspense to an otherwise dull election where people thought the result was a foregone conclusion.”

In the last presidential election five years ago, voters faced the same final round choice; Malas took 42.5% of the vote, but his supporters say he has since matured. In contrast with Anastasiades, his relative absence from politics – bar a stint as health minister from 2011-12 and the 2013 presidential candidacy – has worked in his favour. In a political landscape tainted by widespread corruption the 50-year-old offers a breath of fresh air.

“He is very approachable, very thoughtful and doesn’t have any baggage,” said Maria Hadjipavlou, who teaches conflict resolution at the University of Cyprus. “And he is the first to put real value on the contribution civil society can make towards cooperation and reconciliation in the peace process.”

Cyprus’s division is the longest-running diplomatic dispute in the west. In 1974 a rightwing coup aimed at a union with Greece prompted the Turkish army to invade and seize the island’s northern third.

For more than four decades, Hadjipavlou, a leading figure in the citizens’ diplomacy movement that has grown either side of the divide, has been an ardent supporter of reconciliation. In Malas, who openly supports reunification, she sees the possibility of reigniting talks that collapsed last summer when trust evaporated between Anastasiades and Mustafa Akıncı, the Turkish Cypriot leader. The negotiations had come closer than ever before to ending the partition.

“We need trust to prevail at the negotiating table,” Hadjipavlou said. “Malas also appeals because he has promised to appoint people that are non-ideological to his cabinet, which we haven’t seen for decades.”

Akel’s backing of the academic, however, has raised alarms. The party is broadly associated with the island’s banking crisis in 2013. Accused of doing little to distance himself from the party, critics fear Malas would have trouble being his own man.

His strong first-round performance has also been attributed to tactical voting by traditional Disy party supporters determined to prevent Papadopoulos from entering the run-off. This time, they are expected to endorse a president who is seen as a safe pair of hands.

“What Anastasiades has to offer is economic stability,” said Christos Papamichael, a vice-president of Disy’s youth section. “And he is the only one who really knows how to solve the Cyprus problem. The machinery is all there. If Malas is elected we have to start again from scratch and that would be a catastrophe.”