Some nights, when everyone has left the Presidential Palace and he is left alone gazing at the globe, he looks out the window and wonders: "Why, my God, was I born in Yeroskipou?"
Nikos Christodoulides is not simply the President of the Republic of Cyprus. Let us make that clear from the beginning, so there are no misunderstandings. There have been many Presidents of the Republic of Cyprus. Nikos is something else. He comes from another planet. He is what one would call iconic, magnificent, cosmic.
Anyone who has not realised this has either missed a few episodes or has not been paying close attention. To appreciate the greatness of the man, one only has to see the way the former Deputy Minister for European Affairs looks at him when he speaks. It is not the look of a colleague towards a President. It is the look of a believer witnessing a miracle. As if the Red Sea had parted, the Cypriot vision had passed through it and, on the opposite shore, Macron, Trump and von der Leyen were waiting with candles, chanting Hosanna, while Ms Raouna sprinkled him with rosewater.
Historic Moments
When Nikos Christodoulides speaks, a strange silence spreads around him. Not because everyone understands what he is saying. More out of concern. They fear they may interrupt the eternal flow of History.
The great misfortune of Nikos Christodoulides is that he was born in Cyprus. In a small country. On an insignificant, cramped little island in the Eastern Mediterranean which, objectively speaking, as Ms Piki says, is disproportionate to his stature. Cyprus simply cannot contain him.
The man is suffocating
He wakes up in the morning thinking about reshaping the Middle East and, before he has had his coffee, must be informed whether a pipeline has burst in Tersefanou. He designs Europe’s new security architecture and receives phone calls about lifeguards’ working hours. He thinks about how to isolate Turkey and is handed a file about whether Makarios Avenue will reopen. Are these really problems for a global leader?
Some nights, when everyone has left the Presidential Palace and he is left alone gazing at the globe, he looks out the window and wonders: "Why, my God, was I born in Geroskipou? Why did my grandfather have to come from Choulou? Couldn’t I have been born in Paris? In New York? In Beijing?" How much nicer, and with so many more prospects, it would be to wake up in the morning and, instead of saying "good morning" in Greek, say bonjour, or good morning, or ni hao.
What bad luck
To have been born to govern the world and yet end up inaugurating a roundabout in Lakatamia. He is not, of course, the first Cypriot leader to feel bigger than the place in which he has been trapped. Makarios had the same problem. His robes could not contain him. He wanted the Non-Aligned Movement, international prestige, Nasser, Tito, historic speeches, photographs with Kennedy and television documentaries with newly baptised children in Kenya. The Cypriot President left behind a thousand little Makarioses as part of his missionary work when he departed Nairobi.
Christodoulides, too, cannot be contained by the suits he barters for from Paraikkas the Unbeatable. A jacket may become tight. Ambition never does.
Nikos dreams of triumphing in Europe, passing beneath the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. Arriving in Brussels and instantly changing the atmosphere. Conversations stop. The lights dim. A voice comes over the loudspeakers:
"European leaders are requested to take their seats. President Christodoulides is entering the chamber."
Macron rises to his feet. The German Chancellor takes notes while he speaks. Von der Leyen whispers: "This man sees further ahead."
Nikos, with that calm and iconic smile, spreads dreams and, above all, puts Turkey in the corner.
Not violently. Institutionally. With a roadmap and a timetable. With European Council conclusions and a special mechanism for monitoring the corner.
The problem is that Turkey does not sit in the corner very easily. But that is why initiatives exist. When the first one fails, you announce a second. When the second makes no progress, you present the third as an upgrade of the first. And when nothing happens at all, you emphasise that the Republic of Cyprus now has a strong geopolitical footprint.
The footprint is very important. You may not know exactly where you stepped, but the footprint exists. Clerides called this footprint "the old man’s stride"; Christodoulides calls it "the Little Planetary Leader’s walk."
Trump
In the Middle East, the President is working to make Cyprus a factor of stability. A bridge. A hub. A pillar. A corridor. A humanitarian channel. A safe anchorage. An advanced outpost. Whatever is needed.
In the morning it may be a bridge, at noon a Gaza pier swept away by the waves and in the evening a pillar of stability. No problem. Nikos can do it all, conducting a foreign policy that now inspires everyone.
Nikos thinks about how, together with Netanyahu, he can become useful to Trump. A useful leader, a useful ally or, in the worst-case scenario, a useful idiot. In international politics, no role should be ruled out. What matters is being in the photograph because, without a photograph, there is no geopolitics. There is only a meeting.
Ambitions
His ambitions, however, do not stop with Europe and the Middle East. Those are the easy parts.
Nikos wants Cyprus to host the World Cup. And why not? What do others have that we do not? Large stadiums, modern transport, railways, adequate road networks, water and fifty years of preparation. Those are details. We have vision.
Matches will be played at the GSP, Alphamega and Arena stadiums and, if necessary, at an upgraded stadium in Choulou or the ultra-modern stadium of AEK Korakou.
The opening ceremony will feature halloumi, rides on Cypriot donkeys, fireworks and a giant hologram of the President kicking a football from Geroskipou all the way to Nicosia. The ball will be slightly delayed because of traffic in Limassol.
After the World Cup, it is only logical that larger goals will emerge. Perhaps the time for space will arrive. Cyprus must acquire a satellite launch base. Establish an astronaut academy. Create a Deputy Ministry of Space and Extraterrestrials. Why should only the major powers launch satellites?
And what are we?
After Baikonur and Cape Canaveral, a space centre will be built in Paphos, next to the chapel of Prophet Elias in Tala. As Metropolitan Athanasios explained to the President, Elijah was airborne, travelling in a fiery chariot that flew over Jerusalem and Jericho. It is said that he once also flew over Tala and Choulou.
Thus, the first mission will be called "Choulou 1" and will be funded 60 per cent by European funds, 20 per cent by private investors and 20 per cent by money provided by the Church of Cyprus.
The crew will consist of a scientist, a government spokesman, an adviser, a party observer and Archimandrite Nektarios of Avvakoum Monastery, whom Archbishop Georgios wishes to send to Mars in order to establish the first Orthodox Church for extraterrestrial Anunnaki, whom von Däniken explicitly names in his books.
As for the Cypriot astronauts, they will be the best trained in the world. They will learn to survive without gravity, without oxygen and without water, like cacti of the Arizona desert variety.
The President himself could lead the mission. He would step onto Mars, plant the Cypriot flag and declare:
"The Republic of Cyprus proves once again that it can function as a bridge between Earth and Space."
He would then invite the Martians to an informal multilateral conference. He would propose Confidence-Building Measures and explain the positive agenda, with María Ángela Holguín at his side, before leaving her there as an adviser and returning to Earth.
The Nobel Prize
After all this, the Nobel Peace Prize would naturally follow. Because the Cyprus problem may not have been solved, no war may have been ended and peace may not have been achieved exactly, but intention matters. And Nikos’s intentions are always iconic, as are his achievements.
In Oslo he will receive the prize modestly. He will say that it belongs not to him but to the Cypriot people, to Europe, to the Eastern Mediterranean, to the international community, to Geroskipou and to visionaries everywhere.
Then he will travel to New York, where the United Nations General Assembly will award him the special title of "Little Planetary Leader."
The former Deputy Minister, Ms Raouna, will be sitting in the front row, looking at him in awe. The Secretary-General will applaud. World leaders will give him a prolonged standing ovation. But Nikos, following the advice of his confessor at the monastery of Mesa Potamos, will simply stand there and smile modestly, almost awkwardly.
Truly great leaders never say how great they are.
They simply make sure they have the right people beside them to keep repeating it.
