CYPRIOTISM CAN PAVE THE WAY TO THE REUNIFICATION

History is a branch of science that deals with the sum of the events happened in the past and history should be learned to understand today. As a part of today's reality, history influences and directs our attitudes and preferences. In this context, the awareness of history, the way the history is written and the teaching of history gain importance. As Cypriots, how much do we know about the historical past of our country and the history of the inter-communal relations? 

When the British occupied the island of Cyprus in 1878, ending the Ottoman rule since 1571, they preferred to keep the existing structures of education in Cyprus. Christian and Moslem schools were kept quite distinct and there were two Boards of Education, one Christian and the other Moslem. The books to be used in the schools were prescribed by these Boards, which followed the same curriculum of Greece and Turkey respectively.

The history textbooks were written in the so-called motherlands, which fought against each other in 1821, resulting the independence of Greece from the Ottoman Empire and in 1921, when Turkish Army defeated the Greek troops, which invaded Western Anatolia, leading to the formation of Modern Turkey in 1923. Both events had their influences on the Moslem Turkish and the Christian Greek community in Cyprus. Especially, the Turkish nationalism developed during the Turkish national struggle for liberation from the occupation of the Ottoman Empire by the imperial powers. Though it developed almost a century after the Greek nationalism, it started to be influential among the Moslem Turkish population in Cyprus mainly after the military defeat of the Greek occupation of Western Anatolia. The dissemination of Turkish nationalism in Cyprus was either through the Turkish Cypriot press that followed the example of the mainland Turkish press or through the activities of the Turkish Consulate on the island, opened after the foundation of the Turkish Republic.

On the other hand, the Greek Cypriots were aiming at the union of the island with Greece, a demand put forward often also in the Legislative Council established by the British in 1879. The Turkish Cypriot members of the parliament used to resist these demands by saying that the island should be returned to the original owner of the island, Turkey. After the annexation of Cyprus by the British Empire in 1914, Turkey gave up all of her rights on Cyprus with the signing of the Lausanne Agreement in 1923. The British declared Cyprus as a Crown Colony in 1925 and until 1960, it remained as such.

The nationalism of both Greek and Turkish Cypriots did not originate from local historical circumstances, but was imported into the island through the teachers, books and newspapers,   coming from the mainland Greece and Turkey. This nationalism was encouraged by British Colonial Administration and the British tried to disseminate it among the unaware masses of people in accordance to their traditional policy of “divide and rule”. As the Greek Orthodox community was educated by teachers, who were mainly graduated in Greece, the educational system was under the control of the Greek Orthodox Church of Cyprus. Moslem Turkish Cypriots had their headmaster of the only lyceum in Nicosia sent from Istanbul after the request of the Cyprus Government. The headmasters were all Turkish nationalists.

When the Greek Cypriots started a terror campaign in 1955 against the British colonial administration, the Turkish Cypriot leadership collaborated with the British and provoked the Greek Cypriots by recommending the Turkish Cypriot youth to become auxiliary police and commandoes in order to fight the Greek Cypriot fighters, defending the colonialists.

As the Greek Cypriot EOKA underground organization killed Turkish Cypriot security forces, the Turkish Cypriot TMT underground organization began to kill Greek Cypriots in retaliation. Both organizations were anti-communist oriented and they killed also progressive Cypriots, who were against the partitionist policies of the British and their local collaborators. The growing demand of the Greek Cypriots for the union of the island with Greece (enosis) was encountered with the demand of the Turkish Cypriots for the partition (taksim) of the island between Turkey and Greece.

Finally, neither the Greek Cypriots’ aim for Enosis, nor the Turkish Cypriots’ aim for Taksim were materialized, but a limited independence was given to a new partnership Republic of Cyprus, which was established in 1960. The British maintained their sovereignty over the two military bases and the island was declared as an independent state, banning both the enosis and taksim in its constitution. The Turkish Cypriots, having 18% of the island’s population, were given 30% say in the administration of the new Republic of Cyprus. This was not digested by the Greek Cypriots. In December1963, the President of the Republic, Archbishop Makarios tried to change the 13 points of the constitution by abolishing the veto power of the Turkish Cypriot Vice-President Dr.Kuchuk. Inter-communal clashes started and at the beginning of 1964, the Turkish Cypriots withdrew from the state apparatus. This conflict of nationalisms between the pro-enosis Greek Cypriot leadership and the pro-partition Turkish Cypriot leadership complicated the solution of the ethnic-national question in Cyprus. The unity of action and aim of the Cypriots could not be developed under a common shared aim and this caused new bitterness.

In 1962, we lived the murder of the two advocates, Ahmet Muzaffer Gurkan and Ayhan Hikmet, of the “Cumhuriyet” weekly newspaper, which gave a struggle for the cooperation of the two main communities of Cyprus in the new state. In 1958 we experienced the hunting of the Turkish Cypriot trade unionists and in 1965 came the murder of Dervis Ali Kavazoglu, a communist Turkish Cypriot trade-unionist by the Turkish Cypriot underground organization TMT. These actions of intimidation silenced the democratic opposition within the Turkish Cypriot community, which was fighting against the partitionist policy of the Turkish Cypriot leadership. 

We observe that the separatist policy of the Turkish Cypriot leadership since 1958 was one of the reasons that Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots did not have a common political aim during the inter-communal negotiations, which began after the normalization policy of the Makarios government in 1968.

From 1968 until 1974, various rounds of inter-communal negotiations were carried out, ending with a coup d’Etat by the mainland Greek Army officers against Makarios on 15 July 1974, which was followed by the invasion of the island by the mainland Turkish Army on 20 July 1974. Together with Great Britain, Greece and Turkey were supposed to be the guarantor powers of the independence, sovereignty and the territorial integrity of the Republic of Cyprus. The Turkish Cypriot leadership declared unilateral declaration of independence in 1985, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, on the Turkish occupied territory of the island, which was condemned immediately by a resolution of the Security Council of the UN.   

In the textbooks of Cyprus history, the Turkish invasion in 1974 was described to the Turkish Cypriot students, as a salvation, whereas the Greek Cypriot students were taught nothing about the events between 1963 and 1974. The struggle for the union of the island with Greece during 1955-59 was described as a struggle for the independence of the island, which actually ignored and excluded the Turkish Cypriots, because of the dominance of Greek nationalism.

As imperialist foreign powers and their tools on the island were against the independent development of the Republic of Cyprus, which followed an independent non-aligned foreign policy, they were continuously inciting nationalistic and anti-communist feelings among the island’s population. We observe again in this period that a Cypriot awareness could not be developed to a sufficient degree. The guarantors of the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Cyprus were members of the NATO and they did not want to see a Cypriot state free of their influences. That is why they still do whatever they can in order to prevent the development of independent internal political and cultural structures.

In order to have an awareness of history and to draw useful lessons for the future, we have to have a good knowledge of our history and a multi-perspective approach to our past without any prejudice. For this purpose, it is necessary to have well-educated historians, rich archives open for all, multi-communal platforms, where everything could be discussed freely and a democratic surrounding free of all taboos. Without having all these, it would be very difficult to bring the historical realities to the daylight. We cannot say that the Cypriot communities are quite at ease in these subjects.

History has to play a unifying, rather than a discriminatory role between the nations and communities. As different to patriotism, in the nationalist way of history-writing, the writer chooses "we" in every stage of history and sees "the others" as enemy. It is the same for all the nationalists. Seeing those from his nationality as different from and superior to others is the minimum characteristic of the nationalist history-writers. There are writers, who make this in a harder or softer form. But what is seen in all the nationalist history-writers is seeing his or her own nation-state superior and to defend, if necessary, the interests of his or her own nation at the expense of the others. This way of looking at history and making comments is a dominating characteristic at least in some stages of official history writing in the development of a nation-state.

The review of the text-books and the history-teaching with multi-lateral and international efforts is a very long and much tiring process. The efforts of producing new models for text-books both in European countries and also in Turkey, Greece and in the Balkans are being continued by the non-governmental bodies, historians and social scientists. In this respect, it would be very valuable to form a common committee of the Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot historians which could try to have an interpretation of the common history of the communities living in Cyprus.

I can name some subjects to be discussed and researched by such a Committee: The common rebellions during the Ottoman Occupation against the local governor’s arbitrary taxations. The common struggles in the Legislative Council during the British colonial rule related with the economical policy. The common struggles of the trade-union movement, which used to be united until 1958. The common struggle of the Cypriots against fascism during the Second World War on the side of the Allied Forces.

Since 1974, the influx of mainland Turkish settlers in the occupied areas of Cyprus has been a threat to the existence of the Turkish Cypriots, which is contrary to the Geneva Convention. This led them to re-identify their communal characteristics, which were formed in the course of history as Turkish Cypriot community. Especially the Turkish Cypriot intellectuals started to ask themselves the question “Who are we?”, “How can we preserve our own identity?”, as they looked into the history of their cultural heritage.

As it is well-known, the cultural, the scientific and the literary heritage are the three important components of the national consciousness. Here we see the responsibility of the researchers of history for the development of a common Cypriot consciousness. They have to research the common cultural heritage and use these common elements for a common political aim. The cooperation between the two communities in the commercial and social life and in trade union movement in the past are the good examples of the coexistence of the two main communities in Cyprus.

The class character of the state has a big role to play in the formation of the Cypriot consciousness. There has to be a clearly designed state policy for the support of a Cypriot identity. The organs of the mass media should also play a constructive role in this respect since they can easily reach to the homes of almost all citizens. 

We have observed that especially after 1974, two different identities emerged: One in the north of the divide, possessing the separatist TRNC as an expression of the nationalist identity of the Turkish Cypriots and another one in the south of the divide, as the sole owner of the Cypriot state, which has distinctively an Orthodox Greek Cypriot character. This reminds me the prediction of the British Governor in Cyprus, General Palmer in 1937: “The concept of Cypriot nationalism -which will be emerging as a new concept after Enosis becomes an eroded value- should be pushed away as much as possible and left in the dark. Now it is almost not living. Cypriots are either their district’s “nationalists”, or they are Greek or Turks.” 

The activities of the News Cyprus Association, which was formed in March 1975, were aimed to preserve the existence of the state of Cyprus and to avert the danger of partition by behaving first as Cypriots and then as a member of the respective community. Unfortunately in the past 35 years, this movement of intellectuals could not turn into a political movement, which could organize great masses of Turkish Cypriots and the Greek Cypriots under a common Cypriot identity.  

In order to reach at this main goal, there should be common political parties of Turkish Cypriots and the Greek Cypriots, seeking common political aims. The full equality of all the communities living on the island in the fields of politics, economy and culture could only be achieved through common political parties, which will fight for a democratic federal state and against all kinds of separatism and discrimination.

A correct policy for the solution of the problem of nationalities is indispensable and this is the responsibility of the party of the Cypriot working class, the AKEL. Unless the AKEL review its policy for the Turkish Cypriots and turn to them, no step could be achieved with the existing nationalist policies.  

 

(This article was published in “The Cyprus Dossier: Towards free thinking Cyprus” Issue 00, January 2010.)